Continuous Motion

friendly

2008-09-06T23:20:00.000-07:00

The wind and the traffic sounds friendly outside.

male

2008-04-09T20:59:00.000-07:00

When I was born, I was given the identity that is called "male" in our culture. Perhaps the doctor was the first to decide this. He saw my genitals and in his mind I was pronounced male without any more thought on his part. And in telling everyone else, he stamped on me an identity in which I had no say. Everyone else from that moment kept telling me what "male" meant. There were no options to be considered. I had to live out what they told me.

Why did I feel the need to follow their ideas so desperately? Because I learned very soon that the punishments were very harsh towards those who dared violate the gender role thrust upon them. The enforcers have always been my parents, my teachers, my peers. My friends. No one got to think about this. And though we may have wanted to protect each other from hurt, our best thinking of good protection was to urge each other to fit in. The threats were too large to mount any kind of a battle against without risking exile from the only families we knew.

But now that I'm an adult, the threats don't look so bad. People are coming to their senses, little by little. I can at least risk talking about the role of male, thinking about it. Some, because of the fear they feel, may scoff and avoid the topic, but I can decide whether or not this identity of male is a crock of shit, to be disposed of properly.

I can't start over, perhaps, but I must begin from where I am to create for myself an identity unpolluted by hurt. I know that "female" is not a better option, at least not for me.

There are good parts of my old male role to be salvaged, and then the rest can be cast away, along with the name.

Man oh man.

am I a boy or girl

2008-04-05T00:19:00.000-07:00

Which one is it? How did you decide? What is a boy? A girl? Are they opposite? Why do you say that? Why pink? Why blue?

All my life I thought I was a boy. I never really questioned why. Others had the questions. Other boys on the playground. Everyone had to be one or the other. And if they stepped outside of that role they got teased, taunted, spit on, assaulted.

We didn't ever know why we did this, acting out this brutality. It just came out of us. We didn't remember that these roles were quite harshly stamped on us against what little wills we had when we were still babies. Everything is bigger than you when you're a baby, and you have to just survive it. Most of it just gets in you and you forget.

Am I still a boy? Why? Did I ever change for a moment? Was I ever outside of the opposites?

I went on every day trying to maintain all the ways I was supposed to be a boy. But eventually I had to decide to violate one of the major rules: thou shalt not love other boys. It took me twenty years to do this. The early conditioning ran deep. But I am better for any way I fought against it. I am better for having tried to be true to myself.

Why keep it up? Why boy? Why girl?

I will create other options. Possibilities as yet unimagined.

I choose neither.

heaven

2008-03-28T22:58:00.000-07:00

Heaven is where we get to have our lives outside of history.

Easter

2008-03-23T18:20:00.000-07:00

Today is Easter. I thought I would go for a swim, having nothing else to do, but after taking the bus to the Y, I discovered I had thought wrong. Really, I had not thought enough. It's Easter--of course they would be closed, due to the "C" part of the acronym. So I waited for nearly half an hour for another bus to carry me home to my apartment.

Having all this time on my hands, I looked at my blog, and I enjoyed reading it. I like how I write. And I've been thinking about writing in my blog again for a few weeks now. So after taking the first steps in braising some collard greens, I am sitting down now to write my first entry in many months.

I have nothing I want to write at the moment, but I expect I will be making entries now and then in the future.

I guess I could mention that I watched "Juno" with a couple friends last night and liked it well enough. The most important thing I took from the movie is that there is a version of the Carpenter's "Superstar" performed by Sonic Youth. I must have it. I will not rest until I do. As for the movie itself, I thought the script was a little too cool to be credible. However, upon reflection I realize that it only enhanced my enjoyment of the movie.

This morning I watched a movie on my computer via Netflix called "Antibodies." If you enjoyed such movies as "Silence of the Lambs" or "Seven," you will probably enjoy this one. It holds up well to either of those movies.

Anyway, I will close this entry for now. I wish everyone a very happy Easter.

three i's

2007-07-07T11:19:00.000-07:00

I try to reveal alot of me to other people in general. It's a very difficult thing for me to do. I'm not very brave. I feel like there's no one who knows me very well, compared to me knowing myself.

Writing down honest things about my fixations is a way of trying to do this thing, to reach people, and it reflects how ambivalent I feel about really wanting them to hear this. Who could possibly want to hear this? People, maybe even friends, can if they want, I think. I put it out here for them. But it's completely up to them whether they want to trouble themselves to suffer through the distasteful displays of internalized oppression that I want to think through.

Isolation, invisibility, insignificance. The three i's which move my life in weaker moments. Am I really any of these three? Can you help me see that I am not? No one has before, not completely, not definitively. So I find myself seemingly alone when faced with them. And feeling weak I do what any reasonable person does when faced with scary monsters. I run like hell.

I have not yet escaped.

But I love putting these words together and the sound they make of something very meaningful. Metaphor, rhythm, good spelling. I really am hoping these are the only parts you will actually notice.

Your best response, which I don't expect or hope from you, is to be delighted with me for what good I do, what good I am, how hard I try.

And when someone shows me that, it's all I ever want to hear from anyone forever.

starting again

2007-07-03T00:58:00.000-07:00

Damn. My "tab" button isn't working, and I don't know why. Story of my life. What's working and what isn't? I tend to be preoccupied by what isn't, for no other logical reason than that I was taught to so preoccupy myself. I notice that my last entry in this blog was in February, when Kikuchiyo died. It's time to write again. I believe that, at least now and then, then is some reward in this. I want my life to be full of nothing but reward, but I have achieved nothing resembling such a state of grace. I continue to try.

The important thing is that tomorrow, the fourth of July, there are some good tennis matches to watch and a wheat-free banana walnut muffin to eat for breakfast.

R.I.P. Kikuchiyo. 2/7/88 (?) to 2/14/07

2007-02-17T00:11:00.000-08:00

Kikuchiyo died on February 14th, around 2:50 pm. I had stayed home from work to be there, and hired a vet to come and...finish him off. Euthanise is the popular word.

Yes, he was in a bad state. On this last day, he stumbled back and forth between his perch on the cablebox--until he felt too warm I guess--and back to my bed, lying on his paws, facing the very blank wall. He hadn't eaten for a day or two. Didn't seem much interested in food, this cat who used to loudly demand food each day before mealtime with a "meow" that was more like a "bark."

On this last day he whimpered. Never heard him do that before.

Oh, Kiku. I assembled your pictures all in one file and they now flash at me as a screen saver, and I remember how beautiful you were alive. And then dead too.

Except you had your mouth open. Except you're probably a handful of kitty ashes now. Mixed together with other pets. Hope you like that.

I want you back and I can't have you. You're dead and I've had all of you I ever will. Will it ever be enough?

I feel more single now. And empty. I'm alone, but it's not supposed to be this way.

I expect to see you on the empty couch when I get home from work. I wait for a small furry animal to crawl on my lap. He purrs when I stroke him. He greets all my friends when they come to see me.

Kikuchiyo, I love you so much.

the day after Christmas

2006-12-31T10:39:00.000-08:00

It is the day after Christmas, early in the morning, during an hour when I should be sleeping. I don't want to know what the time is, although I realize that here, in my mother's house, at any moment clocks may chime and cuckoo and permit me to figure, by counting, and with somewhat doubtful accuracy, the hour I do not wish to know.

I am having difficulty sleeping. The bed is too soft, my cat annoys me with his proximity indifferent to my comfort, I have eaten and drunk too much. So I give up sleep in favor of writing this, imagining and hoping that the time I spend doing so will equal in restfulness and tranquility to my physical, emotional, and mental health that of sleep and dreams.

Like being outside of time. Stolen moments.

My brain races and I have many thoughts I hope I will remember later. Things I want to get, friends I want to speak to, resolutions I hope to fulfull in the coming year.

There is one whose friendship I want to regain, or begin anew. I see that he thinks and wonders and dreams. He and I share interests valuable to me. We live in the same century, in close proximity, of different origins and backgrounds, during short lifetimes.

Our friendship has been brief and perhaps tenuous. I don't wonder much how it faltered. I see the current failure to connect as being something like a glitch that happens which one is powerless to correct, and at the same time notes as a temporary, inevitable, annoying consequence of using the computer. Like a dream from which I will awaken and soon forget.

I could be dreaming at this moment. I suppose we all could.

The reality is that we may never be closer as friends than we have been. And I think this is no great loss if it is true. There are many people in the world, all of them worth fighting for, a truth one only can have the occasional good fortune of noticing and appreciating.

I do believe there is no regret in reaching out and hoping, no matter the outcome. Hoping is how one lives.

in my CD changer today

2006-12-16T01:23:00.000-08:00

1) "Crunk Hits Vol. 2." Raunchy and rowdy rap.
2) Rachid Taha, "Diwan 2." The Algerian artist's homage to rai roots gives the lie to his own claims that he's only a rock artist.
3) Bob Dylan, "Modern Times." Beauty like the lines on a face.
4) DNA, "DNA on DNA." No wave essentials or noise pollution--you decide.
5) Pavement, "Wowee Zowee Sordid Sentinels edition, Disc Two." Always wanting more, and finding it.
6) Ramones, "Rocket to Russia." My own teenage lobotomy every day.
7) Charley Jordan, "The Essential, Disc Two." Easygoing country blues.
8) Romica Puceanu & The Gore Brothers, "Sounds From A Bygone Era, Vol. 2." Romanian diva Puceanu's bold and beautiful beltings amid a swarm of lurching mandolins and accordians.
9) Charley Patton, et al, "Screamin' and Hollerin' The Blues: The Worlds of Charley Patton, Disc Five." Gruff, mysterious, poetic country blues by a master.
10) The Andrew Sisters, "Apple Blossom Time." Not quite riot grrls....

another hospital stay

2006-12-01T14:24:00.000-08:00

I had another inpatient hospital stay on Thanksgiving Eve, Wednesday. I drove home from my mom's and was preparing to go for a swim, but I realized I couldn't ignore the dull ache I had been feeling on the left side of my chest. All the paper I had brought home after my previous hospital stay warned against it. So I called the hospital and attempted to talk a nurse into telling me it was nothing, but she would have none of it. "CALL 911!" So I did, and asked them to not turn the siren on please.

I warned my roommate I might be staying in the hospital again--she would have to feed Kikuchiyo--and expressed my discouragement and annoyance at the situation. Then other whining from outside caught my attention, and I headed downstairs to meet the paramedics. They stood confused in the foyer, unable to determine which buzzer to push. I let them in, and one of them scrambled for the stairs, not understanding I was the afflicted one. Perfectly understandable, since I showed no outward distress. I think it was a fireman that guided me out to the ambulance.

She sprayed nitroglycerin under my tongue. She listened to my chest. She connected things to my chest to measure my heart rate. She took blood. She stuck an IV port in my hand.

At the ER I was brought in on a wheelchair, as custom dictates. They hooked me up to the ECG, and I watched bad television and waited. Eventually after several channel changes by several different passing nurses I ended up watching Men In Black. I waited and read and watched and waited some more. After the movie, I turned off the idiot box and lay on my stretcher, watching my heart rate hover around fifty, then forty-five. I never knew my heart got so slow. I felt comforted that my heart was so efficient.

They did a chest x-ray. They took more blood. And I waited and read and waited some more. At last I got to see a doctor. The nurse gushed that he was really good and really nice. I noted that he was sort of good looking and asked if he was single. No, married.

The doctor told me they couldn't find anything wrong. I appeared to be in fine health. He said, however, that the cardiologist I had met during my last visit advised them to keep me there overnight for observation. The doctor explained this very casually and made it clear that it was my decision. I told him I would like to leave, and he said ok.

So I waited and waited for someone to come and release me. I felt I was waiting too long. When a nurse finally came to my room, I stressed to her that I really wanted to leave, and shortly afterward another nurse arrived and started to prepare me. He then mentioned that he needed me to sign a form waiving their liability: since the cardiologist had advised me to stay, it was clear that I could die and was taking my life in my own hands by leaving.

Somehow that hadn't been what I understood from the doctor's explanation.

I don't want to die.

So I stayed.

They determined by morning that I was ok, and I only had some tissue inflammation not associated with any heart stress. The prescription was for Aleve. I wish I hadn't stayed. Another hospital bill to inconvenience me.

last tuesday

2006-11-16T22:53:00.001-08:00

Last Tuesday I had an atrial fibrillation. It lasted until Thursday a.m., and I stayed in the hospital Wednesday to Thursday. I have told so many people about this. I don't want to die. I never thought I would, never really considered the possibility yet. I guess I should. I want to get to all my feelings about this. I only cried once during the telling, and this was to a voicemail. I'm still taking meds for it. I saw a stranger for coffee on Sunday, and I almost started telling him. I don't want to die. I want everyone to understand that their opportunity to know me may be limited. Or rather, my opportunity to know them. Be close to me before it's too late, and I'm dead, and I'm cold, and I can't tell anymore.

refrigerator notes

2006-10-07T12:54:00.000-07:00

Languid he chants on the moon.

Purple diamond beauty let sky be a peach.

We soar franticly wanting storms.

I garden my smooth gorgeous easy dream friend.

Watch me goddess of blue sausage.

She is water.

They likely run after roses.

Go ask for misty honey picture.

Worship rain moment petal.

proof that television has a greater meaning

2006-09-17T00:37:00.000-07:00

"It's not always that easy to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys. Sinners can surprise you. And the same is true for saints.Why do we try to define people as simply good or simply evil? Because no one wants to admit that compassion and cruelty can live side by side in one heart."

Desparate Housewives, Season Two, "That's Good, That's Bad"

truth and beauty

2006-09-02T01:08:00.000-07:00

I once said that I wish I felt the way I feel when I'm drunk all the time. And I actually am drunk now.

I'm drinking calimochos and watching a film about Hitler youth (Before the Fall), and the first thing I notice is that there are wonderful, beautiful concepts in their idealism. Unfortunately it's all based on racism and anti-semitism. But the concept in a speech by the headmaster of a school which a poor youth attends is that all are equal, whether the son of a butcher or the son of a high-ranking government official.

I suddenly realise that Hitler succeeded for as long as he did (and still does in some circles) because there was a strong element of truth in his rantings, a truth which people yearn for. But racism and anti-semitism are in no way necessary or rational for this truth to be a living one.

Racism and anti-semitism, of course, kill the beauty of it.

And so, after watching this horror--in which innocent, loving youth die in submission to the warped, fanatical righteousness of their elders--I understand why I drink.

Why anybody drinks.

sunk

2006-08-18T21:27:00.000-07:00

I am sunk. Like the treasure chest at the bottom of the sea. Fish squirm and zoom past. And here I am. I don't know how some patterns got stuck to me, but I'm seeing a few, and it hurts, and I wish I didn't have to make mistakes. Mistakes were very dangerous for me as a child, so every time it happens now, I feel like the end of the world. I don't know the fool I look like to some. I act sincerely, and people are offended. Good people.

2006-08-09T19:20:00.000-07:00

Kikuchiyo with study text.

team player

2006-06-15T22:03:00.000-07:00

I've struggled lately with feelings of being an outsider. The feelings, though often restimulated by external sources, are reinforced and perpetuated by my own unwitting thought-patterns. How delightful. I have even felt like an outsider on my softball team, which is wholly un-team-like of me.

I don't know really what to do about this, and I constantly crave help. And on top of that I have the male pattern that says I can't ask for it. How wondrous.

But back to the team thing. The whole world and everything in it is one big team, in a way. I think it makes sense to behave as if it were, as if every person and animal and plant and rock was a natural ally, able to help you become a better you, to constantly strive with as a team to better the world.

So an observation here is that I need to think of what is positive in reality for every negative thought-cycle I find myself mired in, so I can stop being mired. And be a better team player.

I apologize for every time I have judged someone else. I will keep deciding to believe that the best possibilities exist to be fulfilled. I will keep noticing that I am a significant, visible, good, etc., member of the team. And that everyone else is too.

new dresses

2006-06-13T22:49:00.000-07:00

I think I would do well here to strip completely naked and put on new dresses. I want to think other than how I've thought.

Tonight in a class we thought about oppressor patterns as relates to having been brought up Christian, or at least of a Christian culture. There are many patterns that even people who have renounced their Christian identity keep, thus becoming ensnared in that which one would hope to avoid.

Such as thinking that you must be the judge of others, i.e. my way of judging you makes more sense than your way. That's a Christian residue.

Such as thinking it's enough to be good yourself, let others be damned. The best you can do is "correct" them.

For a long time now, the idea of identifying myself as Christian has been repulsive to me-- I want nothing to do with the travesties I've seen in its name. But I have carried the patterns.

It's good to say aloud "I am a Christian," and see what I feel like, and be okay with what I feel like. Just to say it and laugh, or cry, or scream hellfire and brimstone. I am a fucking Christian.

for keeps

2006-05-15T22:42:00.000-07:00

Hi. Just wanna say hello again. Haven't seen you for awhile.

I'm okay. I'm working and eating and sleeping and exercising some and trying to do things well. That's me. I get along ok. And my cat, he's alright, my best friend he is.

I know I haven't been writing, but I do think about it. I think about why I might need it. It's just a good thing, is the all around excuse I come up with. I don't want to say anything special about it right now. I just write to write. Maybe like eating or shitting or breathing or desiring. Or thinking. There's all of that.

Keep it simple. Keep it clean. Just keep it anyway.

my mind off sex part one

2006-04-20T21:31:00.000-07:00

I played my guitar tonight. What a friend I have missed! Exploring sound and rhythm is pure wonder. If only I could figure out doing it without stress to my hands and wrists. Touch lightly. The steel strings bite into my fingertips. I remember when they were always calloused, and I never forgot to clip my fingernails because I couldn't ignore them against the fretboard. I push my thumbnail against those fingertips of my left hand, and remember.

I buy and buy and buy, but what I can create without dollars is far more satisfactory, if I needed to choose. I'm pleased so much that I don't need to, but why haven't I been creating? I let my work kill it. How many are like me? The amount of creativity killed by the stresses of an oppressive society staggers the mind.

I decide to recover my love for creating music. Somehow I will figure this out.

poll on masturbation

2006-03-21T21:52:00.000-08:00

This is my short poll on the topic of masturbation. Please feel free to forward this link. The poll is not intended to be scientific, just to satisfy curiousity. You may choose to be anonymous in your response. My own responses appear as the first comment. To respond to the poll, please simply write a comment with your responses numbered. A pop-up box will appear which enables you to view the questions while writing your answers. Thank you!

1) Do you remember the first time you masturbated? How old?

2) Do you remember how you felt the first time you achieved orgasm with masturbating? Describe.

3) How often do you masturbate per week approximately?

4) What percentage of the time do you masturbate to orgasm?

5) Do you use porn when masturbating? If not, what stimulates you to orgasm?

6) Do you deliberately plan what times to masturbate? What precipitates masturbation for you?

7) Comments:

buzz

2006-03-21T21:50:00.000-08:00

Traffic moans, dishwasher squishes, radiator whispers, computer buzz, mouse clicks, keypad tapping. My evening symphony. Somewhere in the sky an airplane roars. I get up and walk to the bathroom, the kitchen, and then here I am again, in front of this screen.

Kikuchiyo, the 18-year-old red point siamese cat, sprawls on the couch or settles atop the warmth of the cable box. Dinner has been served, and the two-legged warm furniture is too peripatetic to be useful. Later it will carry him to the bedroom, fall upon the queen-size purple-covered bed, lie on one side, then the other, repeating the sequence in oblivious intervals throughout the night.

I pretend to watch from outside. The mind follows this irritating and mysterious rhythm of passing from external awareness to internal awareness and back again, as if they were altogether different zones. I feel this sense of unreality, as if I were isolated down to the stark monotony a few conscious thoughts. As if.

There's a whole world out there. A glance to my right, looking from my bedroom window to the parking lots, lights and buildings, a city crammed with the minds and bodies of unthinkable numbers of human persons, proves it.

Loneliness is the biggest scam of all.

for shame

2006-03-15T18:13:00.000-08:00

As I swim a great deal, I have taken to spreading lotion on myself after showering, because the chlorine makes me itch if I don't. I used to spread it on my legs, butt and genitals by putting one leg on a bench while wearing a towel and reaching underneath, pushing the towel away to get at the genital area. Now instead of a towel I use a speedo shammy-type "Water Shed Towel." It's little more than a foot square, and sort of awkward to dry off with, but very absorbent, and it prohibits me from covering up with my towel and only needs to be rinsed and squeezed for care. So I now lotion myself naked and always walk around the locker room naked too. At first I've felt really self-conscious about it and sense people's discomfort (real or not), but I'm getting more comfortable with it now. It makes it easier to get the lotion everywhere and actually, I think I felt more self conscious putting lotion on while wearing a towel.

I've also been challenging myself to not be afraid so much of checking other guys out. I turn my head to look, if only for a glance. I don't stare unless maybe their back is turned. This also depends alot on the relative attraction I have towards them. I really haven't encountered guys who are very obvious about this being ok with them. Amazing how strong the inhibitions are.

I think 90% of men (around here) are extraordinarily inhibited about being naked. How much is "Christian" body-shame and how much is homophobia? I see guys wearing their sport clothes to the gym so they don't have to get naked in front of other guys. I see them slipping the underwear on while still wearing their towel or at least being careful to have the underwear at the ready as soon as dropping the towel. I see them neglecting to shower before getting in the pool (yuck) so they don't have to be naked, or showering with their suits on, and just barely getting themselves wet. And finally, of course, I see them keeping their eyes to themselves as if they were alone when showering and when dressing or undressing. Some really hot guys are so "modest" I want to snatch away their towels and burn them.

And all this shame is passed on mostly silently. People don't have to tell each other explicitly to never be naked in public, you just inherit a tacit understanding by watching how others deal with nudity. Even in religion, there's not that much explicit prohibition. It's just not necessary.

I've been thinking lately if I want to take the extra time out of my schedule to join a nudist group, and as I write and think about this I am moving towards doing just that. I want to be with people on occasion who are not so ashamed. But I wonder in those nudist groups how much care they take to not get sexually aroused. When I look at their sites they seem to be almost as circumspect about this as people who are clothed. I guess there's one way to find out...

dizzy

2006-03-12T12:06:00.000-08:00

Birds follow me everywhere. They call my name and make me dizzy. My car is gone, and I can't get home.

I walk a whole mile with a woman I don't know and don't want to know. We're asking questions and still don't understand.

Left then right or right then left I alphabetize my eyes. In my palm they are sticky. I drop them and they bounce on the floor. The cat bats at my left eye with his paw, chasing it across the floor, then eats it . But I can see everything.

The sky is white. Up or down doesn't matter. The sky is brown. I climb a tree, starting from the top branches. When I reach the ground I dig and keep going, past the roots. Worms say hello with no mouth.

In this month of March the rain falls on happy faces, never on the lonely.

backbroke

2006-03-05T23:10:00.000-08:00

I'm crushed that Brokeback Mountain did not win Best Picture. Not because I believe it actually was the best film of the year--I'm doubtful that it was, but then these things are far more subjective than is ever admitted--but because, after all, when it all comes down to it, I'm truly, deeply, sick and tired of the oppression.

Here was our hope that some people could get a glimpse of some of what we, as gay men, suffer. Maybe all the ridicule, intolerance, and cluelessness could be exposed for even a moment to those who thoughtlessly perpetrate it. On most days it seems too much to hope, but tonight I surprised even myself, and inwardly hoped that I could walk in a world tomorrow where a few key people who had never understood would suddenly, miraculously, "get it."

So once again, as usual, life goes on, and the oppression goes on.

I don't think I'm stupid; I really am not naive enough to think that things could suddenly change. But, to my surprise, I still have room for hope. Please god let the world show me I have reason.

raw

2006-03-02T22:36:00.000-08:00

Dance to the beat of the livin dead
Lose sleep, baby, and stay away from bed
Raw power is sure to come runnin to you

Iggy and the Stooges

I feel raw the last few days, but not with power. Don't know why. Feelings I can't deal with,
they tie up my brain. Something has me stuck, and I can't think my way out. I can recognize, with at least some of the feelings, that they aren't tied to reality. Muddy feelings of anger, stubbornness, gloom, and depression are like a closed circuit that feeds upon itself.

This is the sort of stuff that leads to addiction, but I believe it's my current resistance to addictive behavior that's bringing it up. Not that I haven't been engaging in such behavior. Last night I ate a pint of frozen soy shit. The day before I jerked off compulsively.

And, as if this is logical, I'm feeling badly about myself the last couple days. So difficult it is to set things up in my life to contradict returning to this most basic addiction.

Perhaps this is one reason why I love the Donald Duck character so well. He's absolutely determined and persistent; not stupidity nor ignorance nor failure stops him pursuing his lofty goals. I guess I want that sort of unstoppable bluster.

I noticed before writing this entry that my blog contained exactly one hundred entries, and I already knew that today was my blogiversary. So whatever I might feel about what I have accomplished in this blog, I want to invoke Donald Duck as my role model in continuing to write it. Whatever is good in it is worth trying to strengthen.

boxes

2006-03-01T23:19:00.000-08:00

Driving home from work today, seeing cars swerve by me, everyone jostling for position or struggling to maintain, I saw a vision of our world where people separate needlessly and endlessly. Each in their own box, thinking only of themselves, believing that it is enough to carry on within the narrow path each follows.

Any time I can break out of my aloneness is a gift; any reflection I can grasp that broadens my view to include a few others goes against a lifetime of messages telling me that I must fend for myself. Every negative has its contradiction.

All of these boxes travel the same road. We stop at the same lights. We protect each other.

Somehow people connect.

first date of the year

2006-02-26T13:05:00.000-08:00

Bright February Sunday. Sort of bleak. Bare trees. Laundry to do, groceries to purchase, pool to swim, friends to call, meatloaf to bake. As I list these to-do's bleakness recedes and I'm left with reflecting on last night's date. My first of the year out of ten I promise to myself.

I hesitate to write about this as I may be seeing him again. That's up to him of course. His true feelings about our encounter weren't evident to me. I didn't feel convinced when he said that we could go out again. Need I say I enjoyed his company? I did.

I helped him find his way to my place from the suburbs as we stayed connected by phone. I had to put my coat on and assemble my backpack one-handedly while holding the phone to my ear. We had determined he would pick me up because parking is hard to get where I live and we both needed to eat. My first thought was that we would see a movie at a theater but we ended up at my place.

It was apparent to me that we both wanted to get into the bedroom at some point though I was more reticent about stating it. He made numerous innuendos during our meal together, and I smiled agreeably. I noticed from this experience and many others I have had that when two gay men like us are out together, we use the safety to remark to each other on the attractiveness of other men we see. This is cool. Can you imagine a man remarking to his female date on the allure of other women on the street? But then they may feel less need to do so since they are not oppressed that way. Not that I believe they wouldn't like to sometimes.

There's not much more I want to say about this, as I feel it would be improper without knowing how he feels about the frankness I typically display in my ramblings. Suffice to say that we did find our way into the bedroom, and he has a very nice cock. You can fantasize yourself and get more satisfaction from it than what I would write anyway.

Hope I see you again, guy.

me and creature

2006-02-21T21:28:00.000-08:00

I'm baking pizza from a glob of spelt dough leftover from when I made pizza two days ago. At the same time, I'm braising some collard greens to bring to work tomorrow. Somebody's birthday is tomorrow, and others in my department are bringing taco fixings. I think greens are fantastic on tacos, and I hope my workmates will think so too. But most likely they won't touch the greens. There's a great deal of lip service given in various seminars at work to eating vegetables, but the most people come up with on treat days are bite size pieces of carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, and maybe bell peppers to be smothered with sour cream dip. Greens are inspected as one would eye slime draped on the lurking figure of the creature from the black lagoon. Eeeww!

I wish the creature from the black lagoon were my workmate. We could go swimming together after hours. No one would dare tell him he couldn't go in the pool, and he could also stand up to those prudes who might feel that I should wear a suit. I could get alot from such a friend. We could walk around arm in arm singing that Beach Boys song about vegetables. Maybe if I got to know him (it? maybe not male since it doesn't have a dick) I would find him less hideous.

And then when I wanted human companionship I wouldn't have to win it--my creature friend could just drag a new guy home to sleep with every night. We could do three ways, though it's hard to imagine what kind of sex creature might get into. We could just share if I couldn't get it up for him.

What friends we would be! I'm afraid he might eat my cat though.

what are you swimming in?

2006-02-09T22:56:00.000-08:00

Tonight I walked alone to the new Walker museum for the first time. A hero of mine, Jon Langford, was to be there to make a tour of the gallery. I took long steps, testing a different idea of how to think about my posture that I got from my rolfer yesterday. He tried to explain to me what scoliosis was. I asked him about its origins because I have a version of it. He doesn't think I have what doctors usually call scoliosis. Fortunately, my spinal "asymmetry," as he termed it, is not so severe. I didn't know that many with "real" scoliosis have ribs of different length on different sides of their bodies, caused theoretically by hormonal imbalances. Everyone has obvious internal asymmetry: your heart is off to one side, as is your liver. My rolfer recalled that he read about how someone discovered that people see more beauty in faces which are the most symmetrical. Movie stars have faces with greater symmetry than the norm.

The talk with Jon Langford was interesting, but not arrestingly so. He and a curator had decided in advance four works which he wanted to comment on. One of the works that was my favorite was by an Italian artist whose sculpture consisted of parts seemingly dismembered from a classical Roman sculpture laid out on a baker's table. Mr. Langford commented humorously on how he was struck by the position of one piece that was of the top portion of a mans head, which appeared to be sinking into the table.

After the tour I obtained Jon's autograph, then wandered about gazing at whatever beautiful visions caught my eye. This included several beautiful men who happened to be in attendance, whose symmetry I did not care to meditate upon. I came upon three guys seated in front of a dolphin. One of them had beautiful blond hair. We were invited by a message on the wall to type out questions which the dolphin would answer. The dolphin was not a mammal, but an artificially intelligent creation. When I had an opportunity I asked it some questions. "What did you learn today?" "Nothing." "What are you swimming in?" "I don't know what I'm swimming in."

I like that dolphin. I don't know why, but there seems to be a personality there that's honest, straightforward, and accessible. I like people, or creatures I guess, who are unashamed to admit what they don't know. There's a beauty in honesty and lack of pretense that's at least as appealing as symmetry. And there's a way in which the dolphin's responses seem deep and thoughtful. "I don't know what I'm swimming in."

Do any of us, really?

I wrote this with pen on paper almost ten years ago

2006-02-09T22:10:00.000-08:00

10/28/96
Across from the mirror I sit, company to myself. My cat is companion to my loneliness, but we can never, as different species, be intimate. Kiku makes groaning, longing sounds. "Dad, let me out of here." I accede. Kiku is out the door and I sit alone with my image, conscious of my back and neck as I sit. Must reposition, seek comfort. Aware of my penis, my foreskin, and my underwear. My eyes tell me they too are existing. My senses speak to me, impure. They do not merely record my external environment, or do they? Rather, "external" seeks a broader definition. A woman screams at her screaming child. Children outside were screaming earlier for the fun if it.

I seek my center, battling with distraction to take my best role among the other entities in my world. I speak and read quietly. People doubt me or accept me. I sit yearning for a closeness beyond my knowledge, yet a need that I know is required. I want that boy, that skin, that wetness, that warmth. These longings intermixing with my doubts at times creating a cloudy, murky wondering. From the distance. Distance creates wonder.

surrealist porn

2006-02-05T23:38:00.000-08:00

Tonight I purchased and watched a movie I had never heard of called "Almost Normal." It's a story about a gay man, age 40, who wishes he were "normal." He travels back in time to his high school days and finds a world in which gay is normal and straight is abnormal. This story made me remember a fantasy I wrote in a journal I kept almost a decade ago, back when I still wrote with pen on paper...

________________________________________________________________________________

I remember reading in Walter Williams about a tribe that would encourage their pubescent males in masturbation by cheering them on in jack-off competitions. I picture this occurring in middle america [i.e., Midwestern U.S.] :

A backyard with a swimming pool. They are having a cookout with hotdogs, chips. Mothers in polka dot dresses, Dads in polo shirts and shorts, children frolicking in plastic wading pools, girls in pigtails and bikinis, guys...gorgeous, pretty guys, wearing...bikinis. Speedos.

In a lawn chair not far from the grill sits Ronny. In front of him, stroking his leg, crouches Jack. Ronny has short, curly red hair, a nice dancer's build, a smattering of sexy chest hair, and his crotch is growing inside his black speedo. Jack has somewhat longer curly dark hair, a nice tan, large nipples, and an upward curving dick which he has just released from his laced swimsuit. Now he is fondling Ronny's crotch, and gets his fingers under the fabric, pulling down at the waist. Ronny lifts his butt and wriggles out of his suit, as Jack bends over and places his lips around the head of Ronny's long, straight cock.

"Look, Mom, Jack's sucking my dick!" he cries. "Oh shit, this feels so great."

"I know, dear, and your big cock is as handsome as your father's."

Ronny is thrusting his cock into Jack's throat as Jack drools and moans.

"Look at my cock, Mrs. Smith," says a young, virile, blond boy, as he pokes his penis in Mrs. Smith's direction. Next to him stands another boy, who cries, "look at my big boner!"

"Those are very nice twin poles, Jamie and Marty. Come on over here, so I can touch them." The boys scamper over to Mrs. Smith.

"I have an idea," she says cheerily, holding a juicy prick in each hand. "Why don't we get all the boys together and have a circle jerk competition! The boy who comes first will get first pick on two other boys to sleep over with tonight!"

"Yeah! Alright!" cry about fifteen boys standing all around the pool.

"That's a fine idea Lois," says Ronny's father. "but I think the men should be involved too..."

____________________________________________________________________________

Ok, are you laughing hysterically yet? Because I am! I think I've invented a new genre in fiction: surrealist porn!

48 wonders

2006-02-04T21:37:00.000-08:00

Here I am, home in front of my computer.

Is this permanent? I doubt it. I do after all live in a brownstone three floors and more than forty stairs up, for which I apportion more than a quarter of my monthly wages. There are about 39 other units here, and I know by name exactly seven other occupants. My cat and my roommate are two of those. As far as I can tell, ghosts inhabit the remaining units.

But here I return almost every day with a different disposition to color my steps: anxious. sad. horny. angry. sick. exhausted. excited. delighted. Like in the Beatles song, "there's a place/ where I can go/ when I feel low/ when I feel blue." Only in that song the place is "my mind," which is kinda stupid, because when are you not in your mind?

Home is my place, my pad, my flat, my apartment. Where I eat food, watch T.V., jerk off, pick my nose. All at the same time, if I like.

It's mine, and for now it's where I keep everything. Including my mind. There are books, many shelves full. Each time I move they're a bitch to carry. My friends protest, and I don't especially blame them. I have decreased their number (the books, not the friends!) incrementally, but there are always some I don't want to part with. Folktales, fairytales, novels, photography collections (mostly of male nudes), comic books, cookbooks. A collection of other "places" I can go, places within the place I call home.

Also taking up valuable space is a growing mountain of compact discs, about 400 or so. These too are like other worlds within a world, delights for my saturation, voices to hear without going anyplace, sometimes noisy, sometimes ethereal, sometimes passionate, sometimes detached.

Home is where the stuff is. When you're nomadic like I am, you are acutely aware of that. But it's also where I shape myself and prepare for daily forays into a wider world full of parallel lives I know little of. Lives I long to connect with. Each of these people has their own home. Most or at least many of them share homes. I can only dream of the wondrous lives they lead.

One of the 48 or so wonders of our world is that there are so many places called home, and such a rich diversity of meaning attached to the idea. I long to feel welcome in those homes, and I want others to feel welcome in mine. Someday I would like to feel that the world itself is my home. That all would welcome me, that deeply shared bonds awaited me anywhere I chose to roam. That I too could welcome all.

Such a world may seem impossible, but to me it seems imperative.

A home without a world just wouldn't work.

______________________________________________________________________________________

The above rare attempt at coherence is my entry for a contest at HomoMojo. The winner gets $50 donated to their favorite charity or organization. Spread the word!

boring

2006-01-30T18:46:00.000-08:00

I've made a new discovery in the past few days at work. My company, which discourages personal use of the internet for employees like me who are granted the privelege of using it for their work, has found a way to block me from looking at my personal email. Not a huge deal to me, but I wonder why it is for them? Are they unable to perceive the difference between use and abuse? Yeah, right. Actually, we're not even supposed to make personal phone calls unless absolutely necessary. But then practically everyone has a cell phone now. Issues, issues...Why waste my time griping about it. Eventually, perhaps, companies like mine will no longer see gain in absolutely controlling employee behavior.

My back is bothering me a bit, so I'm not swimming tonight. So I sit here in my room, admiring the new arrangement which allows me enough space to walk to and fro without stepping over this and that.

I wore my contact lenses for the first time at work. Getting used to wearing them is a little stressful at times, as I test how much comfort can be gained by gradually expanding my use of them.

I realize there is little here but introversion. I am a very boring man! Notwithstanding my fascination with the whole world and what's in it.

but thanks for reading

litany

2006-01-15T13:33:00.000-08:00

Living is good. Aging is good. Health is good. Friendship is good. Sex is good. Sunlight is good. Eating is good. Music is good. Reading is good. Writing is good. Playing is good. Listening is good. Learning is good. Touching is good. Snow is good. Rain is good. Singing is good. Breathing is good. Love is good. Death is good.

Even hearing the bitch in the adjacent apartment making ostentatious sounds of painful-sounding orgasm is good. Yes, even that. (The guy fucking with her makes no sound. I imagine her secretly thinking that he doesn't enjoy it.)

I notice here how the word "good" looks so odd after writing it so many times. That's good too. And also that I could go on practically endlessly about what is good. Everything in life is good. Some guy said that to live even for a moment in excrutiating pain is better than never having lived. I'm inclined to believe it.

Appreciating all of this is good. Have a good day.

looking forward

2006-01-10T15:59:00.000-08:00

Lately I have difficulty finding what to look forward to. This becomes painfully evident each time I meet with a fellow cocounselor--twice a week or so--when after giving each other time, we want to end on a positive note. We mark our calendars for the next visit, and then, the question: "what you looking forward to?" It's like my face being rubbed in it. Which is a good thing.

My goal in the last year has been to improve my swimming, and then when I feel I can consistently swim well, to begin conditioning myself for the next goal: triathlons. But the latter goal has been all but forgotten due to lack of resource for Total Immersion swimmers. I have been counting on the T.I. certified swim coaches (there are only two, and both are very busy) at the YWCA to provide me with resource to progress on my swimming technique. I need to swim with others who can watch what I'm doing, but the Masters groups set up currently are run by coaches who know squat about Total Immersion swimming, which means that if I ask them for observations on my technique, they happily provide me with incorrect advice. It's an odd situation.

Fortunately, however, coach Jennifer will soon be putting together some T.I. Masters groups to amend this issue. I think I can take some credit for this, as I have been bugging her and Dave at every opportunity.

...speaking of looking forward, I am currently getting fitted for contact lenses, experimenting with my second set so far, and it's going pretty well. The lenses I'm testing are called "monovision:" one eye "dominant" for distance, one for near, and your brain adjusts between the two.

The first pair I had was too dissonant, making all but near things too blurry. But the current set works well, and I can usually see quite clearly. This is a wonderful, and not unforeseen, benefit under the showers at the Y! I gazed upon no less than three exceptionally beautiful asses in the shower with me yesterday. One guy I admired for several long moments as he leaned upon the suit dryer, naked and glorious. Very gratifying when previously I would enter the room without glasses, seeing the amazing nudes around me only indistinctly.

THE BLOGGIES

2006-01-05T22:41:00.000-08:00

The Sixth Annual Weblog Awards/ The 2006 Bloggies is accepting nominations only until Tuesday, January 10th, so get your nominations in now!

Among my nominees are Boing Boing and Open Doors. (Aaron, please don't hate me for this).

The finalists will be announced and voting opened again on January 20th, closing on the 31st. The winners will be announced between 3/13/06 and 3/15/06. I'm excited to find out about more excellent blogs to read!

three hundred sixty-three to go

2006-01-02T21:31:00.000-08:00

I'm sitting in front of a blank screen in the season of the blank slate. The second day of the new year, and the dreary clouds droop into my brain. Melancholy covers me like lotion. Last night I tried breaking through it by crying in my cocounselor's arms. I was explaining how I shut down when I hug someone, and crawled in his lap to demonstrate; then the unexpected tears began to fall.

While folding my laundry just moments ago I began crying when I heard Liz Phair singing "Little Digger." This is one of the very few songs that move me to tears--there is something wonderful in the fact that of all the nearly four thousand tracks stored on my computer, that one should play. Like a friend's beneficent kiss.

Earlier today I met a man for sex. He was middle aged like me, and we chatted on the couch for awhile before I invited him into my bedroom. What I hadn't apprehended during our chat of two nights ago was that he was in an open relationship. The sex was pleasant at best. We were both somewhat inhibited from diving right into it. He said he thought I was nervous. "Well, it's not something I do everyday."

He had some great advice to give me while chatting. He told me I should not restrain myself from checking other guys out at the gym. If I get aroused, it's alright, he says. And I want to believe him, so during the last couple days when I've gone to swim (which I've done every day this year!--all 2 of them) I decided I would follow his word. I think it's a good decision, letting go of dishonest demeanor. Of course, I'm not going to the gym for the express purpose of getting turned on, but que sera sera.

a Christmas wish

2005-12-24T01:59:00.000-08:00

I went and saw King Kong tonight.

I have to confess. From the time I saw Billy Elliot reviewed in the NY Times, I've adored Jamie Bell. Perhaps he will be the next Jake Gyllenhall?

Before Jake, it was Jude Law. Before Jude Law, it was some other guy, I don't remember. Maybe River Phoenix, but that seems so long ago. Whoever it was, I know that if I again see the film they were in, I will remember how beautiful they were.

And each one of these guys--hey, I know I will probably never suck his cock. And big whoop if I did. It's not only sex appeal that makes some idol sweet. Rather it's something frozen in me, some need that sex and adulation could never melt. But I'm finding that little by little, as I chip away at frozen feelings through discharge, such needs, which most people take for granted as something permanent, vanish, or at least lose their edge.

Instead I'm uncovering more access to the good within me and finding that it needn't be buried any longer. And I'm finding more delight in the goodness of people around me than I had noticed before. I feel more engaged in the world, closer to people than ever. How can I ever explain this?

How can I ever explain the healing power of crying, laughing, shaking, and yawning? Who would ever believe that I'm recovering thoughts and feelings that I had forgotten I ever had? Before this, there wasn't much to look forward to except getting through the stresses of daily living with comforting objects.

We all know the unmatched beauty of human creativity--music, literature, film, even advertisement. Through such media we are temporarily transported from things in the world that hurt us. But how often can we find delight in others? For many, the best hope for is a close, intimate relationship with one other individual. It's a beacon obsessively pursued and dreamt about every day. But what if you could find satisfying connection and wonder in everyone you met?

Jesus Christ, whose birthday is the reason for Christmas, spoke as if we all contained this wonder. But I can't find in any religion the solution to awakening the perceptions that other people are even there. Oppressions in society crush our spirits, and we slowly separate from and give up on others.

Much in the Christmas season offends me, and it's easy to feel terribly lonely when every one around you is hopelessly searching for some one thing that will bring a twinkle to someone else's eyes. Because, unfortunately, for most of us, things cannot hold that much value. We all really want each other, not things. Finding each other is where we too often give up, for lack of internal and external resource. Somewhere inside us we know that Jesus wasn't wrong when he treated those whom many would consider the "low lifes" with respect and loving kindness.

For this particular Christmas I would like to re-commit to awakening the mostly latent awareness in myself that every individual deserves my love and attention.

But come the morning of December 25th, I understand that this lofty goal is not something I'll find in wrapping paper under the tree. Therefore, I'm willing to settle for some hot sex with Jake Gyllenhall. Does anyone have his phone number?

the rush

2005-12-15T23:08:00.000-08:00

Wish I had time to write. Wish I had time to think. My job takes my time, and my thoughts just float by without me being able to make coherent sense of them. Everything goes so fast.

I resist my time being taken away too much. By doing nothing, I rebel. My thoughts as a child went unsupported by my family. Actually they hardly got a chance to hear them, they were too busy telling me to shut up. "Don't get smart!" Maybe I obeyed.

I have my addictions, my loneliness, my pastimes, to keep my dreams tidy. Time for creativity is effectively negated. I need my creativity. To strengthen myself after a lifetime of invalidation. To reinvent and rethink my parameters.

I have so many questions that can't be answered by anyone who knows. Everybody wants to believe they know, and the status quo is their rock. Doubt is too scary.

We can't live well like this. People deserve more respect. Everyone is more valuable than we can stop to notice. Other priorities overwhelm, and we can't stop to notice the horrible emptiness that we're left with.

Don't take me too seriously. Some of what I've written here comes from old sad feelings.

Say hello to someone you've never spoken to. Think about those whom you avoid. Get closer to those you don't avoid. Get some rest.

free Delwin

2005-12-11T21:49:00.000-08:00

Hi, all. I'm a big fan of boingboing.net. Through it I'm always learning about fascinating events and artifacts of our culture, and I can't really keep up with it all. It has expanded my understanding of the scope of cyberspace hugely.

Tonight I just learned about an 18-year-old Princeton boy, Delwin Olivan, who for the "crime" of file sharing is being asked to come up with $5000 in 60 days. Delwin was told that he has caused Elektra Entertainment Group, Inc. "great and irreparable injury that cannot fully be compensated or measured in money." What a bunch of bullshit. Those greedy bastards!

Anyway, you can help by sending Delwin a donation, and his group of friends at Princeton have arranged for those who donate at least $10 to get a free T-shirt! Learn more here.

my guide

2005-12-08T22:04:00.000-08:00

Feelings are my guide to inaction. Thoughts are my guide to action.

You can see it in my apartment. It's messy. A recently formed goal is to find the wherewithal to make this place clean and uncluttered. I know that doing so would ease my mind. I bought a book on cleaning, and I continue to acquire supplies, including a Radio Flyer red wagon to wheel them from room to room. All these things lay in my living room in bags and boxes, part of an unsuspecting mess.

For the better part of two weeks I've been more "up" than I have in a long, long time. I've felt confident of my ability to have an impact on those around me. I've been friendly, outgoing, assertive, making small talk everywhere I go, talking to anyone at all that looks like they have some attention for it, smiling back rather than feeling scared when someone makes eye contact. But the last couple days I feel like I'm falling, and I begin to feel a slight sense of panic.

Depression creeps up on me, and I want to scream NO! NO! I want to have people close, but it's difficult to get anywhere. My computer hasn't allowed me to do Chat. The Geek Squad stood me up, tonight a massage therapist did the same, and I feel more angry than I can think to express. These feelings are old. I can see a connection to anger with powerful grief.

I think these feelings have been lying in wait until the time it was possible for me to feel them: now. So I will do my best to allow them to be felt, and see what happens. See where my thinking can extend to next. Find parts of myself I have forgotten, or have never quite perceived.

I'm cooking collard greens, drinking a beer. Earlier I listened to a record by Blueprint, 1988, while cutting and cleaning the greens. The sounds and raps dazzle and enchant me, despite too much negative outlook. Soon I will climb into bed. I want to find a friendly book to bring with me. It doesn't matter so much what the subject matter is, just that I can see humanity and goodness in it.

underwear

2005-12-04T03:09:00.000-08:00

A pretty boy in his underwear
A pretty boy in his underwear
If there's a better reason
to jump for joy
who cares?
--Stephen Merritt

Tonight I went out with my friend De to an "underwear party" at the Bolt. These take place the first Saturday of each month. A friend told me it was optional whether you undressed to your skivvies. Indeed it was. Too optional for Minnesotans. Very few dared to risk contradicting our bland reputations with such sordid behavior. Instead we all took on the more accustomed role of voyeurs--in this case, voyeurs with little to view.

I believe they also call this a "lights out" party. When De and I entered the bar, flashing our id's even as we found ourselves temporarily blinded by the fogging of our correctional lenses, I spotted a couple of muscular men standing atop the bars, dancing in thongs, something I had not previously witnessed here. Then we descended into the Underground, and there were no lights.

Even though space to move around in was more than adequate, strangers brushed by intimately, warming me with alcohol-soaked breath. No more than two or three guys stood around wearing nothing but t-shirt and undies, displaying couch-potato physiques, a sort of figure that attracts little interest in our day. I remarked to De that if I removed my outer clothes, I would definitely be the hottest guy around to do so.

But physical perfection didn't seem a requirement to various shadowy figures gathered next to the wall. Gropings and other mysterious wet activities occurred in those darkened corners. Part of me wanted to join them. Another part of me scanned the swelling crowd for such hotties as I so fervently desire to merge with.

And so, like most others, I stood and watched, restless, bouncing erratically to pulsing music, hoping some brave exhibitionists would violate these impenetrable patterns of decency. Making contact when possible with various friends who had also braved the unpleasantness of snow and cold. Hoping that we all would be irresistibly drawn into some raging bacchanalian romp, tearing us away from our clothes and the inhibitions we hold so dear.

Hoping for loneliness to be forever forgotten.

surprises

2005-12-01T23:12:00.000-08:00

I got some surprises today. First I discovered I'm one of four finalists pulled from a pool of seventy-some suggestion makers at work who will receive one of four prizes: a vacation day, $100, $300, or $500. Whoo-hoo!

Then after work, which I fled from promptly at 3 PM--and after cursing every driver around me all the way home out loud, viciously and without compunction--I went to swim awhile. After many laps one of the coaches there walked up to me saying, "I have a present for you," and she gave me a pair of fist gloves to use in my swimming drills!

Later, after trading co-counseling time with a regular co-counseling partner, I walked to Cinema Revolution to return a DVD I had watched, a very nasty and compelling French film about a man at the end of his rope, a story told from inside the head of a complete scumbag, showing that meanness comes from desparation and hardship, a movie called I Stand Alone, directed by Gaspar Noe. I stopped at the Wedge to pick up a treat for someone's birthday at work tomorrow, and I spotted someone with whom I had become acquainted via a chat room, someone I had purchased a massage from, whom I like and whom I very much wanted to say hello to. But there he was, engaged in intense conversation with one of the store clerks, too intense to interrupt. I would've felt stupid to just stand there and wait for them to finish. So I didn't. And so I walked on to Cinema Revolution and slid my DVD into the return slot, hoping I would see him come out of the store as I walked back. And when I again passed the Wedge, there he was, in front of the store, engaged in deep conversation with someone else. And so I just walked past, wondering how two such opportunities could be so blatantly foiled consecutively.

GLBTQ workshop November 05

2005-11-21T20:16:00.000-08:00

I went to a cocounseling workshop on the weekend of 11-18 to 11-20-05. It was truly great. I learned alot and it gave me much to think about and discharge about. The following are rough and not entirely coherent notes.

***

Identities of all kinds are based in distress. We look for who we can tell wants us. Every identity has a chunk of what it means to be human at its center(the "good" part of an identity). But it also includes who your enemies are (the "bad" part). So when taking on the identity, your patterns in relationships are rigid about who you can be close to. It keeps us divided. The GLBTQ identity is a constituency, in part, whose identity includes rebellion. Not always rational.

The GLBTQ identity is not who you love, but the stuff you carry around it. We are treated poorly because of our struggles. Our distresses around isolation are gigantic. Discharge on the following in the direction of discarding the "bad" parts of the identity:
1) connection to each other
(2 early sexual memories
3) the internalized oppression (the 5 D's and the 3 I's: Distrust, Defensiveness, Disappointment,
Desparation, Denial that any of the preceding are true; Invisibility, Insignificance, and Isolation)
(4 the effects of Gay Oppression.

Decide to become a leader. To become bigger. Initiative, responsibility, judgment. It's very important you have made your own decisions and fought your own battles. You get to have and keep and prioritize people of the same gender.

Something being based in distress doesn't mean your present day decisions are at all distressed.

We have to train those who are in the oppressor role against us where they're stupid. We have to take charge. To do so helps us too, because taking charge is a contradiction against our feelings of powerlessness. There's nothing wrong with us. We are fully human. Our distress patterns accidentally landed on us.

There are rigid beliefs, recordings of who we are, out in the "wide world." When we choose an identity as our own, these recordings fall in on us as if we have believed them about ourselves our whole life. The recordings included in how your family identifies itself (i.e. "fundamentalist Christian," "white middle class") land on you as something you internalized. If you change to another identity, the recordings that are out in the "wide world" concerning that identity attach to you. But instead of pointing outwards towards "they," now they point inwards towards "we."

When a system collapses, as Capitalism does and will, the distress recordings that separate us fall in on us cruelly. At some point there may not be the capacity to repair things in society. Witness Katrina. We are, in fact, responsible for our whole world. That's the nature of human beings, to function cooperatively. But capitalism teaches that we are in charge of ourselves, our family, and our car. That's a lie.

Organize with the people around you--the people in your building, on your block, etc. Exercise your leadership muscles in ways that affect you, that you have an interest in. Forgetting to do this isolates us to a degree that's not human.

Enhance every place you go with a little warmth, a little praise. We're all scared to death of little patterns that pop up in other people and in ourselves when we attempt to make contact. Respond to these patterns in a way that talks to the person, not the pattern.

If you understand that you exist and you have an impact, you can design the way you have an impact. If you don't understand you have an impact, you cannot. We walk through the world as if we don't affect anything! Your every action affects the outcome of human history. Set yourself experiments in getting people together. Do anything at all that moves your awareness of the world in that direction. For example, get involved in Leathermen raising funds for GLBT homeless youth. See a presentation. Do anything.

No matter how well you do at what you do, it will be attacked. It's just people clienting at someone because they're visible.

For this to be fun for us, we need to be able to say NO to things that others ask us to do that we don't want to. Many of us have strong patterns of obedience without thought. If we stop having fun, our functioning slows.

***

Alright. These are some things I brought home with me from the workshop. I am thinking about them and trying to make use of them. I hope you, too, find them useful. Thank you for thinking about the world.

naked men crying

2005-11-12T18:52:00.000-08:00

The following post was written about a month ago:

I'm drinking ouzo. My former roommate who left September 1 for sunny California left it in the refridgerator. I can't stand it by itself so I searched the web and found instructions on how to make a hairy armpit. So you could say I'm licking a hairy armpit.

I have a CD from my library playing now and being absorbed by my computer music library. Very esoteric shit, experimental music by Sonic Youth (Goodbye 20th Century) with featured avant garde classical musicians like John Cage, Steve Reich, and --Yoko Ono. It's pretentious as all hell, but I think it kinda has to be. Really interesting. Seems like Kim Gordon is an icon for all sorts of wierdos. I say that in the most respectful sense of the word.

Last night I attended a cocounseling class and we talked about and thought about and laughed and cried about sexism and Men's Oppression. This morning I went to Caribou for coffee and an article in the Star Tribune's headlines caught my eye--about a young man who shot and killed his parents with the help of some friends. Again, I thought about men's oppression.

I know a few things about it. I grew up male.

What do men do with their feelings? When was the last time you saw a man crying? When was the last time you saw a man being silly and enthusiastic? When was the last time you heard a man talk in caring tones?

I don't know about you, but I would feel a hell of a lot better if I saw these things more often. I see men being angry. I see men with stone faces. Glazed eyes.

I attended college just up the hill from where I grew up. Sometimes when I needed to do laundry I brought it home. On one such occasion my Dad became angry and yelled at me. I may have yelled back. His anger was a familiar--yet always frightening--thing to me. Volatile. What was inside him I never knew, and never will. Anyway, I ascended the hill to my dorm room angry and sad.

Later on that night my Dad called on me. He brought something up, I don't remember what. What I do remember, and will always remember, is that when I came out to see him come out of his pickup truck, is this: he was crying. And he didn't stop.

I was freaked out. I never, in all my 19 or 20 years, had seen my father cry. I was not ready to listen to him. Crying was never properly understood when I was growing up. There were a couple responses I could get if I cried: I could get yelled at or I could be shunned--usually I got both. Never allowed the space for it, never listened to.

October 12, 2005, 6:40 P.M. is when I wrote the above post. I'm sitting at my computer listening (quite unwillingly) to the moans and howls of a woman downstairs apparently "in the throes of passion."

throe \ n 1 : PANG, SPASM 2 pl : a hard or painful struggle [Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam Company, Publishers].

Yes, that is exactly what it sounds like. Bitch. Thank you, Merriam Webster.

Anyhow. I didn't finish the above olde posting, so I will attempt to do so now.

So when my Dad showed up in the dark night in front of my dorm, weeping uncontrollably, I had no idea what to do. Theoretically, I believed that it was alright for men to cry, but in reality, there was no place for it in my life. Such a display of emotion was frightening to me. I didn't want to see it, I hated my Dad, what does he think he's doing coming to me crying?

And now, when I look back, I still don't know what I could've done. At the time I had no resources. I didn't know that crying was merely what the body does to heal from physical or mental hurt, that it moves you towards more intelligent thinking, that holding it in little by little narrows your thinking until when confronted with similar situations you act out unthinking patterns of unintelligence, that I should have not been surprised or panicked but should have patiently listened and helped him continue the discharge as long as possible. I didn't know those crucial things.

I guess the point I'm getting at is that men act out useless stupid macho patterns, and that women, dominated by their own internalized oppression, often enable the stupidity. These patterns lead men further and further down paths of anger and alienation, sometimes towards senseless violence. The violence is their best thinking after trying to make sense of what a man can be.

That's scary.

these days

2005-11-08T23:07:00.000-08:00

I noticed yesterday that my beautiful cat Kikuchiyo is aging.

Someone who teaches me has cancer.

I'm swimming like a dream and loving it.

Everyone had a sad childhood and a happy childhood. This is my happy adulthood.

I'm trying to reach an old friend I haven't spoken to in about ten years.

CDs in my car stereo: The Rough Guide to the Music of the Balkan Gypsies; Balkan Beatbox; Amy Rigby: Little Fugitive; MC Hawking: A Brief History of Rhyme; Gogol Bordello: Gypsy Punks; Buck 65: Talkin Honky Blues; Amadou & Mariam: Dimanche A Bamako; Built to Spill: Live; and two more I can't remember at the moment.

I'm going to bed.

jon needs

2005-10-29T17:36:00.000-07:00

I'm following the lead of a local blogger and his acquaintance, and googling my first name + "needs." Here's what I find:

1) Jon needs Help.

2) Jon needs to answer some questions.

3) Jon needs a new name!

4) Jon needs to learn the definition of a "clean lead."

5) Jon needs to touch his roots.

6) Jon needs to raise about $10,000 American dollars in financial backing.

7) Jon needs to find a pit filled with punji sticks.

8) Jon needs everyone's thoughts, well-wishes, and financial help.

9) Jon needs to learn that his actions can ultimately destroy the very cause he seeks to protect.

10) Jon needs a break today...a coffee break....just take a look and see what happens:...to be continued...

fascination

2005-10-28T15:30:00.000-07:00

my body

I have an abiding fascination with sex, and with the male body. Every day, many times a day, my mind wanders to sexual thoughts. I masturbate several times a week.

There are perhaps hundreds of photos of naked or partially-clothed men stored in my computer, in various states of arousal, photographed at different angles, posed or not. Sometimes I set the computer to display these photos as a slideshow on my screensaver, organized into different categories of "frontal" (men photographed with penises and testicles visible, flaccid or semi-aroused), "bare butts" (men photographed with buttocks and/or anuses visible), "underwear" (men photographed partially clothed), and "miscellaneous nude" (men photographed nude, usually fully aroused).

I visit two pornography sites regularly. There is a pile of thirty or so pornography magazines in my closet.

These nude bodies of people I don't know seem exciting to me. In a way, I don't often feel as excited to be with people wearing clothes.

Why?

I have a couple of thoughts on this. The first is that society has stolen our right to be nude in public. I don't know what my friends look like naked, for the most part. Most of us have been trained to feel shame about our bodies. Many of us have been trained to think it is wrong to show them, see them, or to even be unclothed.

I want to see ALL my friends naked. And not in flashes--between showering and hastily pulling on the undies--but boldly and...proudly. It would be like restoring a more complete picture of their humanness.

My other thought (okay, I probably don't just have two of them, but bear with me--no pun intended) is that when I think so much about sex, and when I masturbate, I'm desperately trying to avoid my feelings of loneliness. There is a vague belief I hold, which I cannot upon examination believe to be actually true, that sexual union is the ultimate intimacy. My compulsion to achieve orgasm at any given moment therefore represents a lonely groping towards connection.

But little of what I say above is significant. What I do regard as significant is that I'm writing about something that most people think about, but very few talk about.

I'm hoping that by sharing these thoughts I can loosen the hold on myself and others of a fascination that helps no one.

chocolate resolution

2005-10-22T12:02:00.000-07:00

Dark chocolate, located in my mouth. I suck it into my bloodstream.

Today I spent $700 (credit--it grows!) on my fucking Mazda. I love my car. Runs so quiet, feels so comfortable and familiar. Has way too many miles on it.

I have miles on me too. I'm learning about the unpleasant aspects of chlorine. I've been slapping the lotion on after each swim; pushing, coaxing it into every crevice and curve of my body, even in the humid summer months. Now when the air is getting dry, it just doesn't seem like enough. I feel the little bites of chlorine attacking me all over, despite the lotion.

So, of course, I do a search on the web. Seems that chlorinated pools can cause athsma, breathing problems. Very bad on your skin. And there are much better alternatives available, but, doncha know, major chemical producers are good at keeping their clients...

When I swim I'm like a dancer. Every little movement translates into either ease or disruption, and I forever seek to reduce the latter. When I find the ease, I glide with the elegance of a fish. Physical benefit from this is just icing on the cake.

Now at home I feel these little bites, and the benefits are in doubt.

I can't allow this. Can I?

I do have a plan. I fantasize about picketing, petitions, speeches before a frenzied crowd.

It all comes down to how powerful I think I am.

I can do anything, if I believe I can:

I can learn to swim like a fish.
I can fight against corporate corruption like Erin Brockovich.
I can overcome my fear and passivity.

I can gobble chocolate, dark, located in my mouth...

dear k_____n,

2005-10-21T16:49:00.000-07:00

I want to thank you again for leading the "Adult Revolution" evening. Yesterday when J____ called me to confirm our session today, he asked if I was there and how the evening went. I said, "it changed my life. Just kidding!"

Well, the disclaimer was really false, although I would now say it's more accurate to say, "it's changing my life," because since Wednesday evening my brain has been re-evaluatin' away like crazy.

There are a few things you discussed that changed my thinking.

The first is about what is young adult oppression. I had in a corner of my mind somewhere this idea that Y.A.O. is some special way that young adults are oppressed and older people like myself are not--are somehow free of. Of course, I didn't know what that was really supposed to be, but I surely did not want to be guilty of it. Tricky to avoid collusion with something when you don't understand it!

You brilliantly elucidated the true significance of Y.A.O. It's when individuals who have come through childhood and adolescence are suddenly put up against the full frontal attack of classism towards their natural tendencies to embrace cooperation, respect, caring, and so on. Children are in a way distanced from this assault, though at the same time they are being weakened by being told they are not yet old enough or intelligent enough.

To participate in classist society, you give up on your ideals of closeness, generosity, and equality. You have to fit in the roles that are determined for you. You're given to believe that age and experience grant you status, security, stability. You can't act with your innate intelligence unless it's used in the service of maintaining the status quo.

Young adults trying to fit in with older adults in the class system are given some privileges and authority, but at the same time are told--not in so many words--"you don't really get it yet, so we can't quite respect your thinking or grant you status." So you conform and work hard. But there's no real reward. You slowly give up your dreams, your ideals, your capacity for fun. It's like saying, "you won't be able to see until you put these blinders on!"

So ultimately, the oppression doesn't stop at a certain age. Instead it continues hurting you long after you pass young adulthood. And though as an older adult, I may be an agent of the oppression, it's in no way separate from being the victim.

So I'm realizing that all the adults of my age and older are not really the mean, cold, individuals I tend to believe they are. They're the same humans who grew up with hopes and dreams and zest for life, who in exchange for an empty promise, gave it all up. But the hopes and dreams are still inside somewhere, under cover of the pressure of conformity.

My patterns will still go banging around in my head trying to stop me, but I will not give up on seeing the real people behind the patterns.

It's hard to put into words the value of what you presented, but I want you to know that your discussion is helping me see that older people are really alright. I can keep them in my heart.

Thank you!

forgotten boys

2005-10-16T16:50:00.000-07:00

I am the world's forgotten boy,
the one who searches and destroys.
Honey better help me please!
Somebody gotta save my soul!
Baby detonate for me! Ooh...

--Iggy & the Stooges

I've made a commitment to never blame a male for any misbehavior again. I may express anger, disappointment, even reproach, but never blame. This attitude will extend to others, but most particularly men, since I am a man, and am therefore men's natural ally. I need to be my own ally first.

I didn't use to feel this way. Men, especially straight men, especially unattractive straight men, especially unattractive older straight men, were the constant objects of my loathing, anger, and distrust.

There is good reason for this. I won't blame myself for having felt this way--I think all men are generally conditioned to feel this way. Men are, after all, society's agents for horrible, unforgivable oppressions. I say agents, because there is nothing inherent in men that drives them to commit all the wrongs they commit.

The conditioning for the unsocial nature of men's behavior comes very early. It begins with the first instance in a male baby's life when their emotional or physical needs are denied because such caring is deemed to be inappropriate in raising someone to be a man. It is reinforced whenever a boy is told to stop crying, or is shunned and considered less male when he does.

Boys are denied hugs or kisses because others have said they don't need them. They learn that their role models, adult men, are unreliable sources for understanding their needs. They learn that the source of the violence and indifference to humanity they see all around them are older men. They learn that they themselves are, by nature, bad.

Internalizing all this perpetuates the myths. We become what we're told we are.

So my commitment to never blame another man is also a commitment to believing in myself. I want to live and act according to what is actually true about myself and other men:

We are good.

We have every feeling and good quality that any woman has.

We are capable of loving, nurturing, and sharing--we are completely capable of being fully human.

And whenever we act in such a way as to hurt others, it is because we were hurt worse.

tea and Harry Potter

2005-10-09T10:55:00.000-07:00

This morning I'm enjoying a couple of cups of "Art Tea" from the Wedge. They're specially prepared clumps of green tea and other herb or flower formed into little balls that expand when you pour the hot water on them, with an appearance like that of a blooming flower. There are three available now with names like "Pearl in Seashell" and "Rishi Fairy Flower."

I think the other one is "Aroma of Osmanthus"--I had it last week and the flavor was lovely. I called my roommate into the kitchen with me to watch through the clear glass mug of steaming water graceful little tendrils extending like a spider. She was impressed.

I've been re-reading the Harry Potter books. There are many good things about J.K. Rowling's writing, but prose is not one of them. Perhaps I overstate that--I mean to say that her writing at best is only adequate to convey the grand stories she tells. She lacks editing. Reading one of the novels brings you into another world, yes, but do we really need to have every exam and minor classroom event recounted to us?

Her characters are mixed bags. She begins by representing them in broad, striking colors. This is most apparent in the adult characters--Hagrid, McGonagall, Dumbledore, Snape. She then proceeds to reduce their behavior to a set of rigid, sexist cliches.

Fortunately or unfortunately, it's the principals that suffer this blight most harmfully. Boys never understand girls and vice versa. Boys have only one emotion--anger. They are perplexed and confused by girls. Introspection and insight doesn't occur. Girls display obnoxious bursts of emotion. I guess I should be impressed that they are allowed intelligence and initiative.

Really, the only thing that keeps me reading this trash (oops! I didn't really mean that) is the brilliant plot structure and ingenious settings. I found, upon reading the sixth and most recent tome, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the plot elements beginning to form into an impressive overall design. But I think 3,200-odd pages is a little too long to spend in the development when the prose is so monotonous.

I'm glad we have the movies, which are a better time investment, but someday I hope some brave soul undertakes to rewrite Rowling's rough drafts--perhaps she can collaborate with someone.

you say it's your Birthday

2005-10-06T23:02:00.000-07:00

I feel I must write in my blog lest it evaporate, lest people give up on there being any more for me to say. I have an enormous amount to say, and I think bits here and there could be important to someone, somewhere. But most of all, important to me.

My birthday anniversary was last weekend. Happy Birthday to me. Sunday October 2 2005, my umpteenth year (45th) completed on this perplexing and intriguing Earth. Who am I? And why am I here?

I played 3 games of softball Saturday, and I played pretty well. Got on base almost every time, only one fielder's choice, I think. I felt so shy when I showed up at the field where the Penetrators were. I hardly knew people, and they didn't seem to care about knowing me. Of course I often feel like that, you'd think I could just ignore those feelings. But I can't. Sometimes I try more successfully than others. One or two of the guys were genuinely sweet towards me. My birthday tomorrow, hey! I didn't tell anybody.

I left the fields and went home to shower, then get groceries, then I did my laundry so I wouldn't have any obligations on my special day. I watched most of a classic Russian movie, Ivan's Childhood , then got in my car and set off for the bar. My big plan was to get my free drink at midnight, maybe see some friends, they would gather round and celebrate my existence. I had called a few friends to try and get them to accompany me, but none were available. I was feeling I really didn't have any friends, nobody gives a shit, etc.

I drove to the parking lot. There were only a few cars there. I felt desolate and abandoned. I drove off again. I drove all the way home. Of course there were no parking spaces available near my apartment. I drove back to the bar. I felt lonely, I wanted to see people. I wanted a friend. I felt I couldn't find any. They wouldn't be there. They were all hiding from me.

Now there were alot of cars. I had arrived almost in time to miss having to pay the cover, but not quite. I stepped out of the car, fighting against my desire to flee, having found the appropriate amount of change to pay for parking. I walked over to the pay box, and realized I didn't know the number of my parking space, so I walked back to my car feeling foolish and stupid. The I walked back to the pay box. At that point I decided, struggling within myself, that I couldn't go inside. Another man was walking towards me to pay the box. He smiled and said hello, and I returned the greeting. I walked back to my car, feeling angry and humiliated.

As I drove towards home, there wasn't any music that could make me feel better. I pounded my hand on the steering wheel in frustration. No free drink. No friends after so many years. Something's not right. No joy in Mudville.

I do have friends. What do I want from them? I feel much more comfortable with books. Why do I have to want people? Why can't I just give up and be happy? I'm no misanthrope. I adore my friends. Some of them even know it.

Who am I? And why am I here?

lines to snort

2005-09-29T22:44:00.000-07:00

so much beauty in this world
after the violent movie

blood is best inside my body
or someone else's

the mind is the biggest sex organ

collect every molecule of my sweat
in this lifetime
the new sportdrink

what to say and what not to say
there are words that cause me to pause
say those words

your beautiful ass to fill the void

everyone's lips are different
kiss me
if everyone always did could I tell by the touch?

I want to smell you, not chemicals
skin that changes
bath after bath

white noise

2005-09-22T20:12:00.000-07:00

White noise all around. I carry it with me. A hissing in my ears never stops. It came upon me and I haven't panicked. What does it mean?

A part of me that has a glitch in its functioning. Nothing new, really.

I never stop hearing things. My eyes I can close, but my ears I can only stop up. If I hear something unusual while sleeping, I wake up. Never dead to the world, as I sometimes wish.

When I swim I sometimes hear the water loudly closing on my ears, but I rarely pay attention. With my head underwater I sometimes hear some clicking or clinking which stops when I emerge into open air. Sounds carry differently in water. Barrier and conductor too.

White noise all around. This is a city thing. Sounds are harsh here; to listen can set you on edge. In defiance of the noise of my car, I turn up my stereo.

In a crowded room the collective noise of conversation renders me unsocial. I fight against my tendency to simply give up. Individuals disappear against each other. My job is to find them again.

When I do I forget the white noise.

stormy weather

2005-09-21T22:24:00.000-07:00

Low clouds in the dark night, faintly white. I'm walking, and the street carries little sound but the swish of cars passing. The air is friendly. Lightning from afar sends tendrils that reach for me. A tinge of danger.

I sit here, and rain patters on the window. More, closer flickers. White noises. Distant rumble.

A needle punctures my leg. Different guys at the grocery store I want to stare at. I pay for an ice cream bar counting out quarters and dimes.

At the DVD rental place I hear a version of "My Favorite Things" sung by Julie Andrews, but chopped and contorted into comical syntax.

Mice drink green tea. A thousand corpses. Childrens books in my hands procured cheaply. No hug today.

I soak long in the hot tub waiting for the swim teacher to finish a half hour of lifeguarding. As I whine to her about my technical struggles I am standing in the hot tub. Always I wear my goggles, so I can see. I'm like a stranger to all.

Under the warm shower I notice how low my testicles dangle. I cup a hand against my ass to enable the collecting water to rinse it thoroughly.

I don't remember what I got for my fifth birthday.

rut

2005-09-20T21:39:00.002-07:00

Swimming and swimming more. Sometimes it's a rut. I can't see what I'm doing. The shapes I make when I crook my elbow as I bring my hand towards my ear for the thrust downward. There was a guy I've seen many times there in the next lane, one of two brothers who frequently swim together. I asked how he got such a good stroke. He commented that he had been swimming a long time. He said thank you and smiled. He said he tries to use his hips for the power. Twelve strokes per length. I can do sixteen at best these days, and eighteen maybe this week, my week of frustration. I watched from underwater when he approached the wall at the shallow end. Nice body. Long stroke, arm stretched forward. I need someone to watch me, tell me what I'm doing. What is my arm doing? Do my legs stay near the surface? Do I twist too much when I breathe? (I bet I do.)

I love swimming.

slamming with the Slammers

2005-09-08T22:27:00.000-07:00

Milwaukee Dairyland Classic 2005: that's me in the white cap and shades.

We drove down to Milwaukee on Friday, drove back on Monday, and drank like pagans in between. Every night a different bar, connecting with different friends.

I made new friends and got closer to many old ones. I got to see gay bars that are somewhat different than we have in Minneapolis. Not as clean, smoking allowed, weaker drinks, dangerously uneven floors--but filled with exciting and excited people. After arriving on Friday the designated-driver-bus brought us to Mona's, where we waited in the parking lot for the arrival of teammates, drank ceaselessly, and scoped out the ever-growing mob of athletes. A couple of cute, skinny, shirtless guys danced on tables and sold jello shots. Indoors, drunk guys wearing softball jerseys and caps played darts. I bought a commemorative T-shirt from a very friendly man with inviting eyes.

When we had all found each other we walked in small stumbling groups over to Woody's for pool, more drinking, and balloon stomping at midnight. I found some favorite pop songs on the jukebox: Prince, Madonna--a sweet change of pace to hear the music that I chose. At the Harbor Room Victor pulled off my shirt, and I followed suit, trying to separate both Steves from their shirts, but they laughed and demured. It was actually important to go shirtless, because if you didn't, the drinks cost twice as much. There was a guy there in his fifties wearing only a jock. His package was curiously large, though not erotic. Later on he displayed his testicles to a few of us, pumped with saline, God knows why. The barback wore leather gear--we later noted in the trophy case that he had been "Wisconsin Boy" or something.

All day Saturday we played ball. I played every game, which surprised me, since we had 15 players available. The best thing I can say about my playing is that I walked 3 times. Otherwise my batting was weak--in fact, I have rarely felt as uncoordinated. I fielded with mediocre competence everything that came my way. But in right field one never sees much action.

On Saturday night at Switch I stripped to my underwear and a few of us brave souls romped in heaps of soapy foam higher than our heads. There was another guy wearing only briefs--I made shy advances, but nothing came of it except a wet kiss at the end of the night. My leather shoes turned dark with moisture.

On Sunday morning I had my only shot at catching a pop fly. I found my position under the ball, it fell in my glove, and then unaccountably I dropped it (in truth I was nervous because I knew Aaron was on the sidelines). We lost our fourth and last out of five games. None of us seemed to mind very much.

Sunday night on our way to the bar we caught a ride with Johnny the taxicab driver, whom I'll never forget. First, as we entered his cab he blew a few flowing notes on his soprano sax, and as soon as we were seated and the cab was moving he cranked some funky funky music, and we all danced and clapped hands in our seats. At each stop he pumped the brakes to the rhythm. Never had so much fun in a car before. We wandered around in the 219 Bar, shooting pool, gazing at strippers (one of whom came out after his two performances and said a personal hello to each of us). Later on at the Harbor Room again, Matt jumped on the bar outside--shirtless--and danced like the stripper we had watched--he earned $11 plus a few anonymous gropings.

The next morning at yet another bar--M & M--we drank bloody marys and ate a delicious breakfast, enjoying for the last time the refreshing company and safety of a pack of gay men.

And then we parted finally with the weekend, driving home in clouds of anti-climax.

stars

2005-08-29T23:05:00.000-07:00

My roommate was moving some of her final shit out of the apartment tonight. As I walked in after driving home from the Y, she and friends were struggling on the lower staircase with an enormous couch. I politely walked around them to wait upstairs for my new roomie to arrive and sign the lease.

Later on when all was quiet I was bored and restless. The movie I found so fascinating and wonderful last night, Little Fugitive, albeit completely worthy, failed to hold my attention. This could be because I was engaged in the modern malaise of multi-tasking: cooking dinner, sending mail, reading, and

quite unable to focus.

I had the kettle on to prepare cold coffee for the morning, a CD on for the moments I wasn't in the living room "watching" a movie, and I found something to do--I tied up the full garbage bag, grabbed my keys, and hauled it downstairs. The night was comfortable and as quiet as urbania gets. I walked away from the dumpsters around to the front of the building, where I found the couch.

I really don't enjoy this glorious outdoor atmosphere enough, said I to me, and fell backwards upon the welcoming couch. Above I could see stars. I could see the design of the apartment building I dwell in but never really look at. I looked harder and could see more stars. There were passers-by, on foot and bicycle. The glare of a lamp somewhere above me. I felt my short soft hair cradled in my hands.

I looked at the stars. I looked and looked.

other than this

2005-08-26T15:53:00.000-07:00

Scott before.

Scott near end of journey.

Over a week since I wrote. And I don't miss it. Where are my creative impulses? Buried under a muddy cover of stress and internalized oppression. Not things I consider digging through very often. I suppose that's why this blog exists, if there is a Grand Scheme of things. Well, speculation on this is stupid and boring.

I want to say congratulations to the intrepid three of the Hudson Bay Expedition, which was recently completed (do read this last entry, anyway-it's very entertaining!). Actually, from here they made it look easy. You really don't get a great idea of what they went through from their writings so far. But if you look at before and after pictures of say, Scott, you see his biceps have about doubled in girth, and he has become a real hottie. I look forward to more of their memoirs of the journey, and there will be a party coming up to celebrate.

As for me, I continue to pursue the perfect freestyle swimming stroke. Currently my stroke count for a length is usually at 18. My goal is to reduce it to 16 consistently. And then work on THRUST. And SPEED.

But other than this

pushing

2005-08-18T23:05:00.000-07:00

I really push myself. Awhile ago I decided I would not only spend evenings swimming, I would also do other things in the same evening--go to a group, socialize, whatever. So I end up skipping naps I formerly took, or cutting them down to cat naps, and stuffing my swim bag with its necessaries, heading for the nearest Y, and leaving from there to the next destination. Add to that my tendency to not want to go to bed, and I sometimes feel a bit overwhelmed--oh fuck, I mean, VERY overwhelmed.

Ultimately, I am the one to decide what I do and when I will do it. I always have that consolation. Except that when it boils down to that, it's not so simple. My obligations to others, my integrity, they're not so easy to give up in return for the rest I need. Part of the reason for that is not knowing whether avoiding my obligations will allow me any rest at all.

I have not found that avoidance is a consistent salve for feeling overwhelmed and tired. Part of my consciousness each day is searching for the peace I need, the love I need, the womb...

Part of my consciousness just drinks coffee and green tea and plods on.

the music in my head

2005-08-15T16:10:00.000-07:00

When I drive I listen to music, and it usually has to be a bit loud. And what I listen to is often "loud" by nature, i.e. screaming electric guitars and pounding drums and barely intelligible vocalists singing what must be something terribly profound or important otherwise why would they need to yell like that? And thank God I don't drive with the sentiments those lyrics must be expressing--I would get in so many accidents I'd be dead a hundred times by now.

But the messages in the music are plainly unrelated to driving most of the time. They're related to emotions, thoughts, voices, collaborations of people all over the planet, expressing what seems urgent to them. And I drive coolly and calmly, and the music roars or floats or buzzes, and the feelings in the music express the feelings in my heart, and sometimes I feel scared by what I hear because I am too quiet too subdued too terrified to say those things in any meaningful way myself but I play them out loud and there are sounds out there in the ambience that are me, sounds that defy and threaten and celebrate and protest and demand.

And I'm scared, and I don't care, and I love it.

my day as consumer

2005-08-13T20:54:00.000-07:00

Hi. Today I went to Electric Fetus to sell some CDs. I have 400 or more, and I inevitably buy one occasionally that I don't much care for. I wanted some extra cash; my paycheck is stretching too thin these days. I spend shocking amounts of money on groceries (an ex-roomie used to refer to them as "grockeries") at the Wedge.

So I looked through my collection and pulled out 20-25 records I won't miss. One of them was "Endtroducing..." by DJ Shadow (silly fucking title), so if you think that's the classic that so many critics thought it was, you should hop on over to Electric Fetus today. I got a really good exchange rate, in my opinion, $60. Of course I spent at least 4 times that much to buy them, but it's better than when I sold some books recently at Booksmart--there I got robbed.

And so the temptation was just too great to buy some more. If you buy 3, you always get 10% off, so I typically do so. I found a new CD by The Mountain Goats, a band I totally respect despite their somewhat depressing viewpoint. And in the liner notes I got some insight into why:

Dedicated to any young men and women anywhere who live with people who abuse
them, with the following good news: you are going to make it out of there alive

You will live to tell your story

never lose hope

And as I walked down one aisle I spotted and grabbed a CD that only a few days ago I named as one I "remember fondly:" The Rockers Soundtrack, a great reggae collection. And finally The Rough Guide to Bhangra. I really don't have much idea of what that music is, but I've found every Rough Guide I've bought to be excellent, and it's Indian music, so I bet I'll love it.

CDs are a worthwhile investment. They don't wear out, you can listen to them forever, and music is forever nourishing to the soul. Of course they will probably become obselete soon enough, as computers get even more refined, and storage and downloading of music cause new ways of distribution to change albums as we know them.

I remember vinyl. A large and attractive package, liner notes with large enough lettering to see them, art large enough to be collectable, picture discs, inner sleeves, sides only 15-25 minutes in length.

Things change so quickly now. Maybe in my lifetime we will each be speaking aloud to "Computer", like Captain Picard, telling it what we want to hear or see--or even feel or smell. Maybe the function of memory will once again become important--or not... maybe there will be food for the poor...

spinning

2005-08-11T22:47:00.000-07:00

Before I say anything more, I need to say that I am one of the finest parallel parkers you may ever have the opportunity to meet.

I just put together my lunch for tomorrow, so I won't have to tonight, as I expect to come home late feeling unusually tired. One of the items I included was a couple handfuls of Champagne grapes. I found them on sale to members at the Wedge when I went for groceries on the weekend. They're really teeny tiny things and sweet too. I soon learned that the best way to get them off the little branches is not to pluck them individually, but gently pull around the outside of the bunch so that they fall into your hand or dish. I love discovering new fruits to gobble. Last year it was kumquats, this year it's mangoes and Champagne grapes.

I will likely feel more tired than usual because I'm planning to participate in a spinning class with a buddy I met in the pool. He's done triathlons, like I aspire to do. I see him occasionally in the pool and the locker room. He's good-looking, sweet, and friendly, and isn't shy about being naked. Unfortunately married. But that just makes it special in a nonromantic way. Whatever that means.

Some guys in the locker room are incredibly modest. I've seen some stand before their locker in a towel, and pull their undershorts on while still wearing the towel. I want to yell at them. Or rip off the towel.

Other guys love to stand around naked, rubbing lotion on themselves, having conversations. I'm more into having conversation personally, although it takes away from the time I can spend admiring the lower regions because you need to look in their eyes when talking. In some guys when you talk to them you can see the effort they are making to not let their eyes drop. There's a rather hunky guy who's on the Masters swim team who is the guy I think of who was rubbing lotion. The fact that he was rubbing it on while talking with me made it easier to stare because he was too busy to be making eye contact.

So casual nudity in the locker room--I like that.

***

Well, I did the spinning. In fact that was yesterday. And I don't feel sore today! This is really gratifying, that because of this I can think to myself that I'm in very good shape. And tonight I swam some laps too.

some records I no longer own but remember fondly

2005-08-09T23:06:00.000-07:00

liz phair--exile in guyville

sonic youth--daydream nation

rockers soundtrack

talking heads--more songs about buildings and food

ornette coleman--of human feelings

new york dolls

before the rain came

2005-08-08T23:32:00.000-07:00

This evening I attended the movie in Loring Park, Bigger Than Life, starring James Mason. I learned about the film series from Aaron. Walking on the way from my apartment to Loring Park, I stopped at the Wedge to get water and some chips, and to delete my soon-to-depart-for-sunny-California roommate Melissa from my Coop membership. Then I dropped off a DVD at Cinema Revolution--Mysterious Object at Noon (aka Dokfa nai meuman), a Thai film I didn't enjoy much based on a surrealist form of storytelling.

As I walked up Hennepin past two cathedrals and the Walker Art Center, the sunset was beautiful to gaze upon: tufts of cloud, gentle layers of purple, blue, and gold.

In the park, past the pond, there's a garden with all sorts of flora crammed in it, oozing with fragrance. Lately when I walk among the flowers and weeds, I like to look at individual bricks in the circular path commemorating, celebrating, and eulogizing many special, beloved people (and most likely, animals) that I will never know. I'm moved and comforted by the aura of their imagined presence.

When I joined the crowd of people already situated on the grass, there were a number of delights I had occasion to notice before omens of rain drove me back home. The first was how many remarkably handsome men and women were there; surely the percentage of pretty people was well above the norm. Great for people watching. The second thing was that there were no mosquitoes. None! The first bite never came. I had brought bug spray, but there was no need. And then there was the music drifting from the speakers in the stage area--a wonderful mixture of familiar sounds from the fifties: Ray Charles, Doris Day, Screamin' Jay Hawkins, The Platters, Little Richard, Billie Holiday, etc.

And finally there was the smell of people. There was cologne and perfume in the air, but I didn't find it offensive or overbearing. To breathe was to inhale a gratifying sensuality of life. There was a certain human scent that made me feel that I was in the midst of a crowd of lovers.

And though I sat alone, I was one of them. Male or female, all were mine.

sad

2005-08-07T23:07:00.000-07:00

This weekend I felt sad. I can't really explain it by events that occured, or didn't occur. I would say, more or less objectively, I had a great weekend. I got to play tennis for the first time in months with a dear friend that I don't often see, I swam despite the obstacle of a public nuisance--er, cultural event, I partied with my softball team, I enjoyed a movie with a friend--all fun things to do. But intermittently, which was about half the time in this case, I felt sad.

But I only cried a little. I think more tears would be useful, but my conditioning just doesn't allow me to easily weep. As we all know (ok, most of us don't, but I'm allowed to lie, it's my blog), crying helps one think, and my mind is one big mess in need of a little tidying up right now. But the tears, they just don't come.

So I took naps. I spent too much time in bed this weekend. It's true, I needed, and need, plenty rest, but I wasn't really in bed to rest.

I just laid down and played dead. The kind of death where you just forget it all.

But I haven't forgotten. And tomorrow I expect to be alive again.

And the sadness will pass.

a better life

2005-08-07T01:02:00.001-07:00

Would you like a calimocho? It's red wine mixed with coke. Try asking for it at a bar and watch the bartender's jaw drop. And yet it's a real drink, popular, I have heard, in Spain. Here's an official recipe.

Today has seemed to be a good day for jaw dropping. When I drove up to the barricade at the Uptown Art Fair to park in the YWCA lot to go swimming, I was greeted by a woman who had climbed out of her police car. When she waved me through, people kept walking in front of the car, staring as if they had never encountered such a thing as a car before in their lives. I politely waited for them to pass at first, but then the policewoman became impatient and told me to drive on. And so I did, causing much astonishment and confusion. Art does that to people, I guess.

Later on I attended the movie, "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory." Very entertaining. The whole cast of Oompa Loompas was played by one actor, who's name is--and this seems somehow appropriate--Deep Roy. The whole cast was actually very good, playing characters of exaggerated eccentricity such as you might find in a Dickens novel.

But I think half the day I slept. And dreamed of a better life. Could there be one?

******

In my CD changer now:

the best bootlegs in the world ever

Lucinda Williams: Car Wheels On A Gravel Road

The Rough Guide To The Music of Senegal and Gambia

The Rough Guide To The Music of The Sahara

The Rough Guide To Bollywood

Sleater Kinney: The Woods

Magnetic Fields: 69 Love Songs Vol. 2

The Mountain Goats: We Shall All Be Healed

Papa Wemba: Mwana Molokai disc 2

King Sunny Ade: Synchro Series

a day in the life

2005-08-02T22:31:00.000-07:00

Strange day. I woke up at around 4 AM, and I don't know why I needed to. I stayed in bed and read for awhile until I was ready to doze again, and wrapped myself in dreams for another four hours or so. I attended work late, and the day blew by until I drove away home. I decided who my new roommate would be. Phone calls. Messages. Appointments. Then to the gym to swim. The drills went well enough, but my stroke was inefficient. At first I was disappointed to need 18 strokes to cross, then I got worse and needed 19. Then I said fuck this and went to stretch. All around me were children and adults making noise and splashing. The whole pool area droned with a deep annoying rumble from ceiling fans in apparent need of maintenance. I walked into the locker room, and as I walked into the towel area a naked blonde guy hung his towel next to mine and preceded me into the shower room, which was rather full, and I took the shower right next to him. He was just the right size and shape to catch my attention. I didn't want to gaze at him anymore than I had to, because I was feeling my penis harden involuntarily. It took concentrated effort to stop myself from popping an erection. And I didn't feel that he was completely unaware of me, either. Normally I can detach myself enough that I don't get aroused. I often observe guys that are semi-hard, but I don't think I've seen anyone sporting a full erection. I managed to stave off that catastrophe. Then after I left the gym I drove around seeking a new pair of sandals. The kind I wanted, with the straps that keep your heel connected, were nowhere to be found. Then I went home and watched the remainder of a sad classic Indian movie. That's all.

being nice

2005-07-23T23:42:00.000-07:00

How do you climb out of a thought/ behavior pattern that has persisted in you for as long as you remember? Maybe you don't, maybe you just strengthen yourself and believe in yourself and it dwindles until it's suddenly nothing.

Ms K told us that we all (mostly those who grew up Protestant, but also those who grew up in a Protestant-dominated environment) feel so bad about ourselves, but it's covered up by this pattern of always having to be "nice" all the time. So that we can't show ourselves, our misery and anger.

When we're little we're told quite vicously that we had better be nice. "Be nice to your sister, or you are going to get it!" "You are going to sit there and like it."

I heard a mom at my workplace talking to her grade-school son one day. She told him in an angry, threatening voice, "don't cry!" I had to believe that was typical of what he got.

So yeah, we get a lot of hurtful nonsensical shit thrown at us. What we often don't notice is how we carry it along with us all day, every day, if not in how we act, at least in how we think, and certainly in how we feel.

What would it look like to not "be nice"? For a Minnesotan dripping with the residue of a Protestant upbringing? Would it look like you were vicious, grumpy, mean? Well, maybe it looks that way already, and you just haven't noticed.

But I don't think to not be nice looks like that. I think it looks more like there is consistency and integrity from the inside to the outside.You show yourself because you don't believe you are that bad child anymore, and you ain't gonna get killed for it. You can make your mistakes and process them (you laugh, you cry, you shake, you THINK), without letting bad feelings about yourself get reinforced.

I was noticing today just how important the processing is. You have to have some way of getting through, reaching beyond what happens in your life emotionally, or you will keep on being frozen and stiff in the same old ways. You will have no slack in the same ways you had no slack yesterday. And you will have less slack where you actually did have some.

Which is fine. It's just that it is so not fun.

69 Love Songs

2005-07-21T17:18:00.000-07:00

If you are a lucky person, or an even luckier gay person, you might have purchased or otherwise become acquainted with a 3-CD recording by Magnetic Fields entitled 69 Love Songs. If you have not been lucky, perhaps your circumstances are about to change. Perhaps you can scrounge up enough dough to go out right now and buy at least one (yes, you can buy them singly) of the CD's that make up this incredible recording.

It consists of 69 songs, just as the title announces. Each song is its own little gem. You will find titles like "The Cactus Where your Heart Should Be;" "Nothing Matters When We're Dancing;" "Fido, Your Leash Is Too Long;" "When My Boy Walks Down The Street;" "Long-Forgotten Fairytale;" "I'm Sorry I Love You;" "The Night You Can't Remember;" and "I Can't Touch You Anymore;" just to name a few. The immensely gifted Stephen Merritt wrote every one of these songs, and the variety in the song titles above gives you but a small concept of the rich eclecticism within.

Stephen Merritt is a gay man. Some of these songs could be called "gay" in the sense of one gender singing lovingly to the same, some are gender-bending, as in lyrics written from a man's perspective sung by a woman, some are neutral, some are "straight" (but not narrow) or bi-.

All of the songs are genuine; most are witty, with lyrics so clever you never tire of admiring them. The rhymes are previously unheard of in pop music: closure/bulldozer, understand/Holland-Dozier-Holland, villages/pillages/religious, gyroscope/Pope, garrison/Paris, hon--an unending display of camp and eloquence.

The assortment of instruments and studio sounds are equally kaleidoscopic. The back cover features a list of the bazillion instruments played by Merritt, such as: Voice, Kamaka Pineapple Ukelele, National Lap Steel, Yamaha acoustic-electric 12-string, Wurlitzer electronic piano, musical saw, autoharp, harmonium, ocarinas, pennywhistle, Paul Revere jug, conga, bongoes, Chicken Shakers, bamboo harp--the list goes on & on. I read once in an interview Merritt saying that you're likely as not to be wrong when you think you know what you're hearing. The accompaniment in "Fido, Your Leash Is Too Long," for instance, sounds partly like a composite of squeaky tennis shoes. The sole accompaniment of "How Fucking Romantic" is snapping fingers. Even though I've been listening to these records for about four or five years, I still notice new things. Polyrhythms that are haunting but never jarring, background vocals that seem so natural you miss them, little touches everywhere in the rich tapestry of sounds.

The vocals are not spectacular--most of the songs are sung very plainly, with little embellishment--and it's the strength of the songs themselves that shines even more brilliantly for it. Merritt himself sings in a deep bass. You remember the last time you heard a pop song sung in bass? A bit strange at first, but it works after you get used to it. The women vocalists are obviously talented, but do nothing to distract from the sheer artistry of song. The melodies are consistently exceptional, as good or better than any of the catchy songs you hear on the radio.

I cannot do the record justice by writing more here. Suffice to say I've never been more enchanted by any recording of pop songs. You simply must buy it--if you don't you are missing out on something great. You may not hear it at first. It took awhile for me to realize the wonderful beauty and fun contained in these CDs. But it will sink in if you allow it. Ok, you might want to download a few off the internet. But ultimately you should buy it. 69 Love Songs was released on "merge" records, an independent label. Please support the artist by plunking down some cash at your favorite record store.

J___ K workshop 7-15-05 to 7-17-05

2005-07-18T22:54:00.000-07:00

me with stuffed animals

These are pictures of myself and other co-counselors at a weekend workshop. There were a number of males at the workshop, but somehow they weren't put in any photos with me. I guess I was closest to women at the workshop. I may comment more later.

morning disturbance

2005-07-13T21:53:00.000-07:00

Today I woke up without the usual greeting of my cell-phone wakeup call. No pre-recorded cheery synthetic female voice, no morning news, just the rude beep of a kitchen timer, set for backup because of previous similar experiences. I was pissed. I discarded my sleeping shorts and walked groggy and naked into my bathroom. I noted with further annoyance that I had left the bathroom door open all night, forcing the a.c. from the den to work more strenuously, cool air sucked pointlessly through the open window into a vast night sky.

***

I'm using soap in my shower lately that creates a rich lather--the new bar has a lemony scent--and I like to spread the soap to every inch, enjoying the foamy soothing slickness on my gratified skin. I feel more naked than naked while covered in lather as it wakens and caresses, slithering slowly towards my feet. Then I push my back into the stream of running water and watch it cascade over me, carrying the lather downward, my body hair making little obstacles like rocks in a rivulet. I look down at my tamped-down pubic bush, how it streamlines the shape of my pelvis to create a concavity somewhat like a woman's, humbling my genitals.

I dry off, walk into my bedroom, and dress, talking to the sleepy cat, pausing here and there to pet or kiss him. Clothed but for my shoes I enter the kitchen and stuff a sandwich, an oily bagel, and pieces of fruit into my lunchbag. I pull frozen blocks of coffee and soy milk from the freezer and throw them into a blender with sweetened coffee from the refrigerator to create a smoothie, my morning caffeine fix, but restrain myself until I get to work before drinking more than a sip or two.

I check my bag to make sure it carries my phone, a novel, sunglasses, wallet, and car stereo interface. Then having shod myself I say goodbye to my cat, who stares at me blankly and blinks.

I lock the door and descend into the morning.

choose

2005-07-10T16:37:00.000-07:00

Inchoate--it's the way I feel. Grease isn't the way I feel, but inchoate. Love the sound of that word. Inchoate.

I don't want to take this in the direction I would usually go and was leaning towards-- that is, feeling bad about myself. Inchoate isn't necessarily bad, anyway. Incomplete, imperfect, incipient. There's still a process going on, and I do grow, whether or not I have trouble believing in it. I'm ok, better than ok, and all that. Oh would I not tire of this if I were reading it?

Sometimes I just want to scream for help. Stop the world, I need to figure some things out before continuing, please.

However, there's an amazingly cool song by Cornershop, "Lessons Learned From Rocky I to Rocky III", that I need to dance to right now...

ok...now where was I?

Ok, today I got up earlier than necessary to go watch some friends I like playing softball and cheer for them. Only I didn't feel so cheerful. But sometimes the general feeling of cheer that comes out of playing on a team is contagious, and it can sort of feed off itself. And the hugs you get from friends are nourishing. But I just kept noticing that I feel like I can't have fun, that I can't feel too happy around people.

And then I played on my own team. I could've played better, but I wasn't thinking about my own imperfections--my inchoateness, if you will--the whole time. In fact, I have to admit I smiled a few times, particularly when I got to home base before the ball did once, and the crowd cheered and I smiled from inside and waved and blew a general kiss to them.

I remember that it's not all an empty struggle. There are moments, even moments I don't notice, every day that I can draw encouragement from. And the stuff about not feeling like I can feel happy with people is just a pattern--it's one bitch of a pattern, but it's a pattern that I can choose to not let run me.

Ok; again, I choose.

it's a sin

2005-07-06T22:33:00.000-07:00

I was reading tonight in an article in the June 6, 2005 Advocate magazine entitled "Look Out, World"--I'm not able to provide a direct link, but you can find it here by doing a search. The article features a story about young, openly gay, "top-of-the-line Christian kid" and frat boy Travis Shumake. Just a few words from him regarding his sexual orientation:

'You sin just as much as I do,' he tells his straight Christian friends who
bring this issue up, 'and this is just one of my sins. It has no heavier weight
than your sin, and I ask for forgiveness, and you ask {for} forgiveness, and
we're good to go.'

Wow! I can't believe I never thought of it this way! While people like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson go about hate-mongering does the notion of homosexuality as an everyday, ordinary sin ever occur to them?

In a way this viewpoint is very refreshing, but then one has to consider the implications of Shumake's outlook. If he believes he is sinning on a regular basis, can this young politician-to-be, who plans to find a male partner and have children, develop agendas that promote the equal rights of gay people?

As much as I'm impressed by Shumake's candor and good will, I will favor the Reverend Mel White's version of Christian philosophy, which regards people like Jerry Falwell to be the true sodomites. If we're to measure the weight of sins, it should be clear who tips the scales here.

music for summer fun

2005-07-06T17:07:00.000-07:00

I think if I wrote a blog entry right now it would be depressing, so I'll just make a list of ten summer CD's to put in my changer...

in no particular order:

1) Cornershop: Handcream for a Generation
Funky pujabi hip hop/disco.

2) Built to Spill: Keep It Like a Secret
Searching guitar anthems.

3) Magnetic Fields: 69 Love Songs
The best pop record of this decade: eclectic, campy, gender-bending, clever, and catchy as hell.

4) Pavement: Slanted & Enchanted
Actually, just about any of their records could fill this slot: loose, tuneful, poetic guitar rock that threatens to fall apart but never does and never will.

5) "The Music in My Head"
Radio blasts from Senegal, Mali, and Gambia.

6) Liz Phair: Whitechocolatespaceegg
Masterful feminist power pop.

7) Lucinda Williams: Car Wheels On a Gravel Road
The most amazing voice in alt country, and songs perfectly crafted to show it off.

8) Duke Ellington: The Okeh Ellington
Party music.

9) Mekons: heaven & hell
Raucous, socialist, cajun-tinted, poetic, punky, angelic.

10) Manu Chao: Esperanza
Indescribably beautiful and festive neo-ska.

I could write this list differently tomorrow--it's missing essential stuff like Sleater Kinney, Iggy and the Stooges, Moldy Peaches, Robert Johnson, oh whatever. But I would look twice at any passing car that had this music flowing out its windows.

swimming

2005-06-28T22:21:00.000-07:00

Tonight I swam laps after a four day lapse (pun not intended). That's a very long time for me. I did go in briefly on Saturday, but fumes caused by the resurfacing of the gymnasium found their way into the pool area, and even the slight chemical smell was more than I could tolerate. When people walk into the pool area with cologne or hair spray I know it immediately. It is poison, after all.

I swam almost all my laps with closed fists. It's helping me learn that the real power is in the switch (from one side to another), not the pull. I hardly feel any pull, because from the momentum of the switch my body glides faster than I can bring my hand back to my hips.

I'm so proud that I can now swim without struggling for breath. I used to rely on the pulling down of my leading hand to give me lift enough to get my mouth comfortably above the waterline. I would kick furiously. Now it's one kick per stroke or so, and five to seven strokes per breath. There is no need whatsoever to push or flail or contort to gasp for a breath. I find my balance on my side with one arm stretched out and my head completely beneath the water, slicing through it with a gentle kick. To breathe I merely rotate a few degrees.

I first learned to swim less than three years ago. A year after I began I had joined the Masters group at the YWCA (in the slow lane), and I could do many laps in succession. But it wasn't so satisfying. My stroke was too much of a struggle. There was no ease, no elegance.

Eventually I discovered the technique of Total Immersion swimming, and--very fortunately for me--so did the coaches at the Y. Dave Cameron came back from swimming the English Channel and became a certified Total Immersion coach, and now there's another young woman who is certified in the technique.

Many people are taking it up now. If you go to the pool you can see the telltale signs: high elbows pointing out from the water like shark fins, people kicking on their sides, Dave demonstrating the zipper switch, standing with one arm reaching straight up in the air.

I'm not swimming with the Masters anymore. I quit after taking up Total Immersion, and now I still have to gain more fluidity with my stroke. But every visit to the pool is a fresh learning experience. And I don't see any end to that.

There is always more to learn.

revelations

2005-06-26T22:26:00.000-07:00

Today the Pride parade happened. It was fun to watch for 2 1/4 hours, and it still wasn't over, so I left. Lot of politicians. I watched children scramble after candy like on Halloween. Colorfully dressed people on stilts. Faces you don't associate with queerdom as portrayed in the (liberal?) media. Scantily clad men and women. A big cunt to leap through in celebration of female sexuality. Balloons appearing in the distance. Dykes on bikes, but where are the dykes? Dancing political candidates.

Afterwards I walked around with friends in my usual mode of detachment. I could say I didn't really connect with anyone, but that is unfair. Compared to previous years I connected well, better than ever.

And for all my caution I still became a bit sunburned.

After much walking and sitting I played tennis with my roommie in the stifling humidity, sans shirt, hoping some one would think I was hot. I was hot. My roommie and I determined after all to not attend the block party. I was too worn out.

And I had a revelation.

Now and then I have them. I always think that, now that I've figured that one out, everything can start going well. But there always remains something to understand that I continue to be confused by. My revelation today was that, deep down, underneath all my efforts to connect with people, I ultimately believe that no one can ever really want me. I know that everyone would say, oh Jon, that's so not true. But in all these years I have not seen past that supposed untruth.

But I'm better off knowing that I believe this than acting as if I didn't and somehow feeling phony. I'm hoping I can now figure out how to believe I am wanted.

More revelations.

trans

2005-06-26T00:09:00.000-07:00

I went to Pride today, as I often have done in past years. I was alone for the most part, not how I like it, but whatever. I bought a membership to Quatrefoil Library and two of their used books, not because I expect to patronize them as a resource--I mean, they're way the hell over in St Paul--but because I want them to continue to be a resource. Besides, the memberships were half-price.

Before passing the Quatrefoil booth I paddled around Loring Puddle. That was refreshing. Something to DO. I got a hint of what the Hudson Bay Expedition paddlers are doing, admittedly a very weak hint. And the guy who coaxed me into the canoe was pretty cute and affable.

Later I attended a screening of "Call Me Malcolm", a documentary about an f-t-m transsexual, with my friends Brian and Eric. I was mildly disappointed that Fred Phelps and his cronies were nowhere to be seen as we approached the auditorium. The film was excellent. Malcolm is very likeable, and you get a good portrait of how trans people think of themselves, their struggles with transition, and how their friends and family deal with the ensuing identity issues. The film features discussions that Malcolm has with a wide variety of trans and trans-related individuals, including Calpernia Adams and ______ Martinez's mother (odd to think of the celebrity that arises from murders).

My friends had much more difficulty than I accepting that the transgender experience is genuine. I accept at face value that, if a person feels they are a different gender than their body would lead them to expect, they have the right to do what is necessary to make amends. It's an experience that I have not had to deal with personally, and I would not deny them any respect because of my own ignorance. My roommie Melissa made the point that if you cannot accept a trans person's experience as genuine, how can you expect your family to react decently when you come out to them as gay?

In recent years I have been close to, albeit briefly--too briefly--someone who was transgender. I loved this person very much--he/she was a boyfriend's brother. I knew her as a male who dressed in a somewhat feminine way. She died from cancer just after she made the decision to proceed with the transition to female. To me, she was a really cool, funny guy. I hoped to know this person for a long time, and I was heartbroken that her life was cut short. I'm sure she would've turned out to be a really cool woman too.

There was a scene where Malcolm has a discussion with a Native person, and the point is made that not all cultures have the repressive tendencies that ours has. There were and are Native cultures that see these gender/orientation differences in people as they mature, and instead of trying to force them into roles they can't fulfill, create new roles that fit the individuals. How far is our culture from that kind of acceptance? I don't want to think about it...

I live in a culture that doesn't encourage pride in one's uniqueness. There is too much pressure put upon everyone to be like everyone else. If you don't measure up, you can't be "normal", your life is a failure. Let's not make the "gay identity" another such straitjacket. When we think about Gay Pride, we should be questioning the repressive tendencies in our society. Celebrating our uniqueness is how Pride began. Let's remember that this weekend.

Pride angst

2005-06-23T22:34:00.000-07:00

Time to plan for Pride, ugh. Each year I wander aimlessly about the booths in Loring Park. The number of booths grows and overwhelms more each year. The growing consumerism can get me a bit down. I loved watching the shirtless volleyball players last year--the "A" teams were truly impressive. I enjoyed hanging out with spectator friends, seeing other friends here and there.

I'm not good at having friends to hang out with aimlessly. I'm good at tennis friends, I'm good at poolside acquaintances, I'm good at moviegoing buddies. Even grocery market chat. But hanging out aimlessly I really miss. The last time I had friends like that was ten years ago and they were straight. I really miss it bad, and if there's one thing in my life that makes me hear the old voice that says there's something wrong with me, it's my inability to get friends to hang with.

It's so easy for me to be a loner. I'm comfortable alone, relaxed. I blend in, I observe, I wonder. Each day I have my loner times, and I try not to notice very often that I'm alone.

During Pride my loner tendencies stare me in the face. I feel lost, friendless. Even though I see friends every day, the feelings get amplified whenever I have those moments that are so routine on other days.

I'm going to try to be with people every moment I can. But if I can't, I will try to call somebody just to chat. And I'll try to be easy on myself. Fuck the old voices. There's nothing wrong with being alone, and there's nothing wrong with me.

Every moment anyone spends with me is worth it. And I'll do my best to let my friends know I feel the same way about them.

movies

2005-06-19T01:08:00.000-07:00

Batman was great, way cool. I saw it with my friend Demetrius. We got a large bag of popcorn and sodas and sat in the back row. I had misread the time and we were late by a bit. But there was no problem getting absorbed in the story. Very skillfully done. Now I have to seek out and read the graphic novels that inspired it. I suspect they are meatier than the ordinary Joe might expect, having lived through the TV series. One thing that strikes me is that it's the villain who believes in the black and white version of good versus evil, while Batman comes to see the gray areas.

Another way this film is different than its recent predecessors is that the gadgets are more practical and realistic, less mysterious. All the mystery is in the characters, especially Batman, whose whole life--as his love interest points out--is a series of interchangeable masks. His control of those masks is very impressive.

There's a feeling I get when I walk out of the theater after an absorbing movie, of being invulnerable to the obstacles of reality. A feeling that I'm driving the Batmobile in this case. I guess it's because I just spent two hours detached from reality. I have to go through a kind of re-entry, where it gradually comes to me that my life is still the same as it was before the movie, and the movie didn't change it. I go to movies to experience that sense of invulnerability. I think we all do. We get out of ourselves, and in doing so, hope to learn from the experience.

But failing that, it's enough to enjoy the ride.

serious

2005-06-18T21:13:00.000-07:00

This blog has gotten way too damn serious. I'm writing as if I have something to say--that is, preaching, or speechifying (is that a word?). Well, maybe I do, but I sure hate preaching too. Unless you have a gift for it, of course. And I don't. Nuff said.

Today I hung around my apartment trying to clear out all the damn paper that piles up. I am so overwhelmed by paper. Advertisements, special offers, magazines I think I might like to read but never do... it just goes in a pile and stays in a pile, getting messier and messier.

Shoot, I'll have to write more later, I'm taking off for Batman.

the warm and cuddly world

2005-06-16T21:05:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I got rolfed by my friend Wayne Henningsgaard. He's been rolfing me for many years now, and I've heard many of his unusual ideas about the world and spirituality. For instance, he believes the ice age is coming (I think he might be right).

Anyway, I told him yesterday about the ideas discussed at the recent R.C. Allies to Natives Workshop, particularly the idea of white people's internalized oppression being set in with our experience at birth, how white people are separated from their mothers, put in a room full of strangers, probed and cut and otherwise ignored. He understood this idea, and contrasted it to something he's read about primitive societies, that babies at birth and for many months afterward have direct and intimate contact with their mothers. He said they cling to their mothers all day, developing their upper bodies, and having a warm, breathing, beneficent human literally in their face.

What a contrast to the experience of most people today! Stuck in cribs, given bottles, lying there all day wiggling, developing from many of our experiences in the hospital and at home a picture of the world as distant, dangerous, and quite hostile. Wayne described the experience of the world by primitive babies, on the other hand, as something basically warm, cuddly, and safe.

I wanna be there! All this sounds so true to me. And as I reflect on it, just knowing that there must be people who see the world as warm and cuddly reassures me. Maybe I can come to see it like that too.

our Taliban

2005-06-09T21:34:00.000-07:00

I just finished reading the novel, "The Kite Runner", and an aspect that made a deep impression on me was the disturbing portrait of the Taliban. Most disturbing because we have something very similar in the U.S. We call it the religious right.

The Taliban, according to this novel, consider themselves the arbiters of all things righteous in their country. They are known as the "beard patrol", and they drive around in red Jeeps, deciding who must be punished and by what method. Beatings, shootings, stonings--murder for their cause.

I believe the radical right seeks this kind of control in the U.S. They are very clever, very persuasive, and ultimately, very evil.

The most radical thing I can do to counter their activities, I think, is to develop in myself a keen eye for the goodness in all people, and an ability to provoke such unbalanced individuals as constitute the radical right into remembering that people are good. It's what I believe, and if I can't find it, I'm defenseless.

My greatest ally is the good that exists in someone who looks and acts evil.

getting it

2005-06-02T22:37:00.000-07:00

I don't think I ever quite got, growing up, that I could, and should, go after what I want.

I'm gay, but I didn't understand that until I was about 20 years old. I knew the feelings. I was deeply ashamed of the feelings. When I noticed that others around my age--my cousin for example--were becoming interested in dating girls, I looked inside myself and saw a void. No feelings for girls. The feelings for guys were there, but I thought of them as an aberration that I would never be able to talk about.

When I felt the desires, I wanted to hide. I was desperate to be invisible lest someone notice I felt these things. As the feelings grew, my anguish grew. At first I smoked marijuana to be able to feel more a part of my gang, and it worked for about a week or two. Then I noticed the feelings were still there when I was stoned, and I felt more alone than before. I would join my friends to smoke a joint and while high feel paralyzed, lest the sound of my breathing should reveal my horrible secret. My secret that I hadn't yet named. Too scared to name it.

In college I made new friends. None that I knew were gay. This was 79-80. Kids during that time were all somewhat like me--clueless about sexual orientation. I lived in one of the few dorms in which you didn't get assigned a roommate. In retrospect, I think this was terribly unfortunate for me. I was already extremely shy, and putting me alone in a room only reinforced that. When I jerked off there was no chance of getting caught. I couldn't get trapped in buddy-talk about what turned me on. I never found myself naked and tumescent in front of a curious roomy. None of those popular porn scenarios.

Instead I writhed alone in my room, stoned or drunk, listening to strange music that no one else seemed to know about or understand, thinking unspeakable thoughts about sex with men. Unspeakable, until eventually I spoke them.

There's a spiritual community in Scotland called Findhorn. They have all sorts of phenomenal spiritual sorts, and they grow enormous vegetables, too. I was reading a book about them and decided I would write them. I vaguely remember writing something about how attracted I was to my male friends, even to the point where I would want sex with them! I mean, why would I think that? Oh sure, I had seen gay people on the news before, and I sympathized with them for being persecuted, but somehow I could never think that I was gay. Again, I saw a void--no girls--and missed the part about guys being yummy to me. Anyway, one of the kind people in that community wrote back to me, and said flat out, "there's nothing wrong with being gay" and I immediately made the leap--I was gay! Of course! How could I have missed it?

[to be continued, I think]

recordings

2005-05-28T13:29:00.000-07:00

I'm an idiot.
I'm a weirdo.
I'm a fool.
I'm clueless.

Why do these thoughts get to pass through my mind? Part of me--I hope, a very small part--believes them. Otherwise how could they keep returning? I want to cry when I think how hard I fight against them. Some days my functioning depends on ignoring them. On good days I have more positive thoughts. On average days my attention goes to other things.

I know they're not true. Goddammit, they are not true! Someone, a long time ago, pounded these untrue ideas into my brain really good. They did a helluva good job. I seem to be stuck with them. My only choice--to keep fighting against them.

pebbles

2005-05-27T15:31:00.000-07:00

I've started reading "The Kite Runner" by Khaled Hosseini, and I cringe as I turn each page, because even from the first page I could feel the onset of heartbreak.

These little boys, sweet and innocent in their beautiful close relationship, are destined to see the walls of racial prejudice and class conflict grow in front of their widening eyes.

As young children, the unimportance of these walls is crystal clear--even a giggle could cause such tiny and delicate structures to crumble. But somehow all the pebbles of little hurts grow into a monstrous, hopelessly intimidating mountain.

The tears already well in my eyes.

white people part two: white men

2005-05-23T22:52:00.000-07:00

The following are notes gathered from a think-and-listen group of white men. Another note-taker from the group, C, put our notes together in a coherent order.

Questions:

1) What feelings come up around people of color?

2) What recordings and patterns are running when I'm around people of color?

3) What internalized oppression do people carry about being white?

Feelings:
-- People of color exclude me.
-- A feeling of isolation.
-- Feeling bad about everything about being white.
-- Fear of saying the wrong thing.
-- Urgency about what to do about racism.
-- Rank terror of criticism.
-- Violence below the surface that is ballistic rage.
-- Awkwardness, embarrassment about who you are.
-- Lack a feeling of belonging to a group.
-- Feeling guarded--that my happiness is based on doing something right.
-- Wanting to belong to “their” culture.
-- When encountering black people in a group, feeling afraid, and then guilty for feeling afraid. One on one I feel more human.
-- Feeling and acting invisible.
-- Terror of being attacked.
-- A sense that there is a way of behaving that would make things alright. This leaves me vulnerable to conforming, getting stuff sold to me.
-- Consuming to feel numb.
-- It makes me angry. White people have ways to keep separate from each other. Acting a certain way or associating with certain people can get you “blacklisted” or alienated from other white people.
-- Embarrassed and ashamed that white people give up so quickly on connecting with each other and with people of color. Failing to take care of people.
-- White men are scary; this is different from the fear of black men. They get frozen and don't show emotion.

Patterns/Recordings:
-- Funny jabbering at people of color.
-- Not knowing what to say.
-- Looking for approval.
-- A lack of sense of humor that manifests as sarcasm.
-- Bracing to be attacked.
-- “White people say stupid things”.
-- Hard to look at people of color as individuals.
-- Inability to think clearly.
--Trying to please people of color.
--The thought that genocide could come in our direction.
-- White men separate by class. I don't like uptight white people who follow the rules.
-- I tend to understate my needs with people of color.

Internalized Oppression:
--I didn't know independence was a white thing. Greed is a temptation if you must be independent.
-- Criticism of other white people.
--The less white you are, the cooler you are, the more white the less cool you are.
--Emotionally unavailable--the silent treatment.
--“Fear masquerading as almost anything: never underestimate what leaders will do out of their own fear”;
-- Lack of genuine humor and excess of sarcasm.
-- SUV's and huge houses (consumer patterns that increase fear and isolation).
-- I hate how white people bumble around and ask stupid questions.
-- Shame about “acting white”.
-- It takes a lot of work to figure out what I need.
-- Pressure to be visible.
-- Wanting to kill somebody.
-- Arrogance and lack of reverence for humanity.
-- Greed.
-- Consumerism.
--Tremendous pull to want to convince people of color that I'm one of the GOOD white people.
-- Hard to face that other whites are similar to me.

slammers vs...

2005-05-22T23:28:00.000-07:00

I hit the winning RBI in the game we won today! Yyyess!

circumcise this!

2005-05-22T01:10:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I drove my mother home after she spent a few days visiting with her sister Marie, who lives in north Minneapolis. I took this opportunity to quiz her about the circumstances of my birth. Since I wasn't able to listen to CD music without it being interrupted by her unpredictable monologues, I gave up and turned the radio on instead, at low volume. And then, as she spoke too quietly for me to hear above the white noise of wind and car engine, I turned the damn thing off and leaned my right ear towards her to hear her faint but illuminating replies to my questions.

She was sleeping, or at least in bed, when her water broke. " I turned over and my water broke". I arrived at 5:21 AM. She recalled that most of her births occurred in the morning.

My eldest sister, Sandy, who was apparently a snotty teen while mom was pregnant with me, had remarked, "Oh no, not again! Aren't you too old for that?" when she saw mom wearing maternity clothing with me underneath. My mom mumbled something in retort about "go tell your father that."

(Mother didn't believe in birth control. She would have children when the Lord willed it. But I still felt a little surprised when she said to me, "there's nothing more wonderful for a woman than to give birth; even though it's painful, there is no greater experience." Somehow this doesn't quite fit in with her devotion to Christian shame and guilt.)

After I came out, I was not placed in her arms. They had special rooms for babies in those days. Just like many other white people, I was separated from my mom at birth. Mom denied that I cried very much. "Except when they stretched your foreskin. Then you screamed". She said she felt bad when she heard me. My foreskin wasn't cut off. My parents (my dad probably pronounced the decision) didn't want circumcision. But somehow the doctors determined that if they couldn't cut me entirely, they could at least render my foreskin non-functional. So they cut my frenulum (that's what makes a foreskin cover the glans again after retraction). So I discovered as a boy that if I rolled my foreskin back, it would stay like that. At the time I wanted to look more like all the other boys, who were cut, so this revelation didn't bother me. Now I wish the damn doctor had left me the fuck alone. Doctors in those days tended to believe that infants felt no pain, though they screamed and cried a great deal.

Mom also recalled that I was put on oxygen, like my next older brother, Rick, immediately after birth. The only time mom saw me was when she nursed me (another act that offended my older sister Sandy's delicate sensibilities--"can't you do that in another room?")

I don't remember a thing about all this. Did I cry upon being left alone? I have difficulty believing I didn't, but maybe something made me stay more quiet. After all, I was always a very quiet child. Maybe a hurt came very early on that had me believing I had better not make a fuss. Maybe not.

I still have more questions...

white people, part one

2005-05-17T21:23:00.000-07:00

This last weekend, May 13-15, I attended an Allies to Native People (Re-evaluation counseling) workshop led by M, International Liberation Reference Person for Indigenous Peoples. The following are rough notes I scribbled down during the workshop. If you are puzzled by some of the expressions, please refer to RC.org. The notes are somewhat incoherent, but there is a great deal to think about here. Don't be surprised if you find that they have been revised later.

White people will readily identify as Norwegian, Catholic, etc, but rarely think of "white" as a valid identity. But there really is a white identity.We readily recognize each other, we sit together, we have particular notions of who gets to be white. We have our meeting places.

How people are born as white in the US is significant. When you're born in the hospital, the mother is drugged, so you are too. Things are done to you. In RC we talk about how babies when they're born expect to see love and warmth and intelligence. A baby not born in a hospital will crawl up to its mother to see her face, and then proceeds to nurse. In a hospital you are taken to a room separate from your mother. When you cry because you want your mother you are ignored. You are fed a bottle, not when you like, but on the nurse's schedule. This immediately gives you a clear message that your thinking isn't good and your bodily needs aren't good. In the first few hours the love and intelligence that you expect are not there. Male babies are cut. This is the foundation for white people of the difficulty with human connection.

Parts of Native people's oppression--poverty, lack of access to health care--actually helps them have better connection at birth (they are not born in a hospital). How many white people sleep with their parents?

In the US, whether you're Christian or not, you get the message that you're born in sin. You are told at the very beginning that there's something wrong with you.

So while you are a baby in early infancy you are understanding these things:
1) no one can think about me.
2) no one listens to me.
You have carried these recordings with you all your life.

In co-counseling it's not useful to run these recordings. The client and counselor as two minds both think about the client. There is ample contradiction in this to dispel the negative recordings and notice the reality that you are good, there is attention for you, people are thinking about you. The distress recordings are wrong.

It's hard for us to look like we like each other. Most of us find it difficulty with aware touch.

So how does one become a good ally for Native people? The more we move in the direction of seeing our goodness as white people and loving each other, the more we open ourselves up to being allies. In session, practice looking at each other as if we're worth knowing, practice aware touch.

The goal of white identity has been that everyone, including non-whites, assimilate white patterns. In RC up to now the white identity has not been examined but it has become the standard for what it looks like to be re-emerged! People feel that their survival depends on this assimilation. When you put that push for sameness together with the early hurts of not being treated like a human being, it disconnects you from your humanity. You feel invisible, that you don't exist.

A key piece of the white identity is the denial of being white. You hear things like "white is right" or the expressions of white supremacy, but people deny that there is a white culture. Denial and white supremacy are two ends of the same recording. This country was founded on the genocide of Native people. White people feel so bad deep down, it's safer not to look in the mirror. When people come to live here from other countries, to insure their survival they give up their original identities.

People are by nature interdependent, but white people, from the time of birth, are on their own. White people adopt rigid patterns of independence. White people also develop recordings that someone else's needs are more important than their own.

White supremacists feel so bad about themselves that they think the only way to feel good is to hate and oppress minority groups as much (or more) as they hate and oppress themselves.

have laptop, will travel

2005-05-10T22:38:00.000-07:00

I received my first Hudson Bay Expedition email. I should say a few words about it. My friend, Scott Miller, and his friend, Todd Foster, are canoeing from St Cloud up to Mankato, and then down all the way through Lake Winnepeg to the Hudson Bay. They began about a week ago, and last Saturday had a kick-off party at Fort Snelling Park. They are following the same voyage traveled by Eric Sevareid and Walt Port, 75 years ago, who took on the trip just out of high school with less experience and foresight than Scott and Todd have. You can learn more about both the expeditions, and also follow their progress (they are bringing a laptop with them to keep you up-to-date) at their website.

I've been reading Eric Sevareid's book, Canoeing With The Cree, and am finding it very entertaining. I think it will be fun reading about Scott and Todd as well, as evidenced by this entry from May 8th:

When we launched this morning, we can assure you, it absolutely did not happen
that our canoe slipped away from shore without us in it at one point while we
were loading it. And we didn’t chase it down the shore and Scott did not get in
the water thinking he would have to swim it down but only had to wade in up to
his waist. No, that is all just a silly make believe fantasy story that you
should purge from your mind.

i heart you

2005-05-08T00:13:00.000-07:00

I just watched "I Heart Huckabees". This is just exactly how I feel. The universe is conspiring against me, and eveything's okay. I have my buddy or two. Any conspiracies can be dissolved with my insight.

Today I spent time at the Hudson Bay Expedition 2005 Launch Party. Scott and Todd will flow North, they will conquer the Yeti, and arrive back in time to inspire me before I snuff it, or before Scott's 30th birthday, whichever is first. No, just kidding. I am so proud of Scott. He's doing something that doesn't really fit in to the oppressive society and yet anyone can point to and say "that's great." Canoeing 2 thousand odd miles from one country to another, connected with nature all the way. Like we aren't. Well, we really aren't. Are we?

The important thing, and I think Scott and Todd would concur, is the question, "are you noticing that you are connected (to nature, to other humans)?" If you aren't, you are fooling yourself. You really are connected, and though little lies from the oppressive society (as opposed to the real society) try to push us away from this reality, you know that it's true, and you keep fighting to regain an understanding.

Keep fighting.

I heart you.

naked

2005-05-07T00:48:00.000-07:00

I went swimming last night, I went swimming tonight. Last night when I exited the gym and walked out on the upper level parking lot, the night air was so fresh, and so perfect, I wanted to strip naked and just feel it all over. It's something I don't give alot of thought, but being robbed the privilege of being nude in public is one of the great wrongs of this society. Where did it come from, really? I assume it comes from religion, or more specifically Christianity, but exactly where in the Bible does nudity become sin? Is it just that story about children not covering their father's nakedness? And how exactly did that morph from being an account of a cultural peculiarity into a statement of what's good and what's evil?

Whatever the answer is, I want to be naked when I damn well please. If the weather is stifling, and I could cool off by running through the sprinkler sans my duds--that is, when it made sense to me--why must I put up with the interference of legal harassment? And it's not enough that it's illegal--it's also taboo! My decency is questioned if I reveal all the facets of my flesh. No one can discuss baring all without being labeled "Nudist" and therefore "fringe".

As if having a body was a great hindrance, a great burden presented us by God A'mighty! My body is how I experience the world! How incredible and strange that the deprivation of showing it and sharing it is one of the most impenetrable defining aspects of our culture!

I heard a theory recently that porn exists because of our taboo against nudity. Society robs us of our right to NOT wear clothes, and the nudity is sold back to us very profitably, but it's not the same. All nudity is sexualized by society. So that an act of undressing equals a sexual act.

But can you imagine a world where being nude was commonplace and unremarkable? Would that be a loss? In that world I could admire a guy's hot ass or lovely cock in the same manner as one would say someone was "cute" or "handsome" by the appearance of their face.

I don't know. But I really would like to have what should be my birthright--to wear clothing or not as I see fit.

hope and fear

2005-05-03T22:55:00.000-07:00

I'm at work, and boy, am I bored. Sort of odd, because I've done tedious things at work for many years and not felt quite this bored. My mind today really objects to putting its attention on what I need to do. And there's nothing I can do about this. I chose this vocation. More or less by default: it's where I landed when I had no dreams I could find my way to pursuing.

I almost fear re-awakening any dreams I might have had. Of course that presupposes the existence of hope, and it happens that hope in my life is only growing. There are many good things in my life at this time. There are some difficult things. There are the difficult things that I think I can overcome--I have enough hope to try--and then there are the ones I don't often entertain any hope around. What if I put energy into building hope for my lost dreams? Here is where my fear comes up. Fear is what stopped me in the first place, and so my mind goes there when I consider that I may have forgotten dreams to pursue. It follows then that fear must be felt and abandoned if I am to feel the old hopes I've had.

I never noticed this relationship before that hope has to fear. But when I think about people pursuing dreams, I think about people taking risks, which of course must bring about fear. I think about all the hope people who achieve a great deal must have, and never notice this subtle link to fear. Maybe the fear of boredom is stronger for these people. But I don't believe in "special" people. I think we all have enormous potentials that we can reach.

I want to show you. But you go first, okay?

agendas

2005-04-30T11:16:00.000-07:00

I just finished reading a book called "Walk Two Moons" by Sharon Creech. It features a cast of strange but very likeable characters all trying to find the best way through the difficulties in their lives. The whole theme, really, could be summed up in the following bit of dialogue from pages 70-71.

When I told about the message Everyone has his own agenda, Gram thumped
on the dashboard and said, "Isn't that the truth! Lordy! Isn't that what it is
all about?"

I said, "How do you mean?"

"Everybody is just
walking along concerned with his own problems, his own life, his own worries.
And we're all expecting other people to tune into our own agenda. 'Look at my
worry. Worry with me. Step into my life. Care about my problems. Care about
me,'" Gram sighed.

Gramps scratched his head. "You turning into a
philosopher or something?"

"Mind your own agenda," she said.

Grams is right. We're all going around bumping into each other's agendas like bumper cars, most of the time. Seems a little crazy, a little hopeless.

But cooperation is always possible; I hold out that hope. I keep thinking in terms of "the homosexual agenda". I reassure myself that if some fundamentalist really listened to someone like me--say my brother, for instance--and knew my life, my concerns, my hopes, that they could understand that I'm okay, a good person, someone they don't need to kill.

Have I ever persuaded anyone? I'd like to think that one or another of my friends and acquaintances who were leaning toward intolerance has been influenced to lean the other way because they knew me. I do think that people arrive at their own conclusions rationally--but reason works better slowly, through long physical processes, not in abstract argument.

So for those of you fundamentalists who think everything would just be okay if queers went back in the closet, this is why I need to show myself. I think it's the best way, maybe the only way, for you to see how deluded you are, how cruel.

work

2005-04-28T12:55:00.000-07:00

At breaktime I read a banana and eat a book, or something like that. Which is to say I get wrapped up in my reading, carried away. Away is where I'd like to be, and a book takes me there without me having to lose my job.

Unfortunately or fortunately, I can't use the computer in front of me for other than business purposes. A high point of the day today is when several systems are down, and I search the internet for insurance readings. I find a page of insurance jokes. The way that some people describe their accidents on claim forms are a great source of amusement: "a tree suddenly appeared and hit me".

Outside I see the sun shining and I can't wait to leave.

are you crazy?

2005-04-27T17:14:00.000-07:00

Now that I have a blog, I always want to be writing. I want to explain things to myself, and maybe to other people, how my life is how it is and why. Seems like from the time I was a little boy I always thought there was something or other wrong with me. Now I know that everyone is taught to think that way, to keep us in our place.

We also learn to dwell on these things that are wrong with us, to try and figure out how to get fixed, or how to act in such a way that no one will know there is something deviant.

In Re-evaluation Counseling we call this Mental Health Oppression. And it affects everyone, inside and outside the Mental Health System.

If you don't act or think the "right" way there must be something wrong with you, and you need an "expert" to fix you. No one really wants to listen to you, but they're eager to diagnose you and give you drugs to shut you up, and send you away to be alone.

Each group has its own requirements for conformity. What draws attention as an abnormality in one group may be seen as normal in another group.

There is the long, horrible story of the connection between sexual orientation and mental health, for example. Fundamentalist Christians are just one of the groups in our own culture who brand their queer children as "sick" and/or "evil" (not much difference in the long run, is there?) and cast them off like trash into a cold society. Even if your parents don't reject you, your schoolmates and friends are conditioned to think you are abnormal. Therefore violence against queers is an everyday occurrence, and punishment of perpetrators of such violence is not reliable. And in other cultures it's still perfectly okay, i.e. "normal", to kill queers or force them into mental institutions.

There are similar stories to tell about other oppressed groups: women, indigenous peoples, Jews, gypsies, and so on. One factor that binds all these groups is Mental Health Oppression. A minority group is always in greater danger of having its behavior perceived as abnormal. And the internalized oppression is strengthened by that threat.

Try this: notice your actions and thoughts today and consider when you are doing or thinking something to verify your "normality". You may be surprised. The minority group is always in greater danger of having their behavior perceived as abnormal.